86 



13. (6) The brain of the patient was examined at the research 

 laboratory, department of health, and negri bodies were found. 

 (7) Guinea pigs inoculated with cultures from this brain con- 

 tracted rabies two weeks after inoculation, thus confirming the 

 diagnosis of rabies as the cause of the girl's death. 



Dr. Fielder volunteers the information that the research labora- 

 tory of the health department examines a considerable number 

 of cat brains yearly, as many people are bitten each year, and 

 that in 1913, 14 out of 46 cats examined proved to be rabid. 

 About 50 people in New York are obliged to take the Pasteur 

 treatment each year "because of bites by rabid cats, or by stray 

 cats possibly rabid which escape and so cannot be examined." 



Dr. John B. Huber asserts that in the last six months of 1914, 

 42 persons bitten by cats received Pasteur treatment. The cats 

 that bit 33 of these persons were examined in the New York 

 City laboratory and proved to be rabid. Mr. Harold K. Decker 

 of West New Brighton, N. Y., writes that a mad cat bit several 

 people in that neighborhood in 1914; it bit a dog which also 

 became mad and bit other dogs and cats. The people bitten 

 were saved by the Pasteur treatment. 



Rabies among cats has a long history. Fleming, an authority 

 on this infection, says that dogs and cats "hold first place in the 

 scale of susceptibility."^ He reports or cites the loss of a large 

 number of human lives by hydrophobia induced by the bites 

 of rabid cats.'^ 



Septicemia or "Blood Poisoning." 



The following list shows a number of more or less serious 

 injuries resulting from the bites and scratches o^ cats, as reported 

 by my correspondents: — 



Injort. 



Number re- 

 porting it. 



Serious bites (1 fatal), 

 Serious scratches, .... 

 Blood poisoning from bites. 

 Blood poisoning from scratches, 



Fatal 



Damage to eyes, .... 



Loss of eye, 



Corneal and other ulcerations of eyes. 



> Fleming, George: Rabies and Hydrophobia, 1872, p. 02. 

 « Ibid., pp. 47, 54, 55, 60. 64, 147. 246. 



* One caused loss of use of arm for two months; another caused loss of a part of one hand. 



* One cmuaed loss of two fingers; one caused death of infant. 



