134 BACTERIA IN DAILY LIFE 



all reference to the tubercle bacillus in relation to 

 milk. At the present day hardly a bacteriological 

 journal is published which does not contain some 

 reference to the question of tuberculosis and milk, 

 and the transmissibility of this disease when pre- 

 sent in cattle to man. 



As regards the dissemination of various zymotic 

 diseases by milk, the evidence which has been 

 collected points very conclusively to the respon- 

 sible part which may be played by milk in this 

 connection. Many instances have been cited, also, 

 of the culpability of milk in distributing typhoid 

 germs. A striking case which occurs to me, and 

 which may be mentioned in passing, is one which 

 occurred in a city in America a few years ago, in 

 which an outbreak of this disease was traced to 

 a dairy in which the vessels had been washed out 

 with typhoidal-polluted water. No less than 386 

 cases of typhoid declared themselves in six weeks, 

 and of this number over 97 per cent, occurred 

 amongst families obtaining their milk from the 

 same dairy. A careful inspection revealed the 

 fact that the milk-cans had been rinsed out with 

 water from a shallow well contaminated with 

 typhoid dejecta. 



Diphtheria is also justly associated with infected 

 milk, and if we take into consideration the now 

 established fact that diphtheria bacilli thrive and 



