CONTAGIOUS DISEASES OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS. 145 

 REMARKS. 



Without seeking to detract from the importance of any one position 

 taken by the congress, it may still be well to emphasize some that have 

 a special value to the American statesman. 



1. The extension of the incubation of lung-])lague for months, and the 

 frequent occurrence of occult and unrecognized cases of the disease 

 show how essential it is to stop all movement of animals in infected dis- 

 tricts, except under license, after an extended supervision, including 

 statistics constantly corrected; also to kill out an entire infected herd, 

 or to maintain the above-named strict supervision for a long period (six 

 months) ; also, to prohibit the contact of adjacent herds in neighboring 

 parks, &c., and their successive presence in the same pastures, on the 

 same roads, or at the same drinking troughs. These dangers are just 

 those of which it has been most difficult to persuade our United States 

 legislators and our non-veterinary administrators of State sanitary laws, 

 and on the fundamental blunders made on these points de})end our fail- 

 ure hitherto to extirpate lung-plague. 



2. The idea of the spontaneous origin of lnng-i)lague in the present 

 day is effectually set aside. An abiding confidence in our i)erfect se- 

 curity from this disease apart from imported virus is essential to thor- 

 ough work. Whenever the possibility of spontaneous cases is admitted 

 this will be made a cloak for slovenly and ineffective work. 



3. The voice of the representative veterinarians of Europe and Amer- 

 ica has been given against the assumption that inoculated animals can- 

 not infect a sound animal. This is a decision of no small importance 

 as *.'is operation of inoculation is extensively pra(;tice(l among us, and 

 thouih it enables the individual owner when left to his own resources to 

 save the great body of his herd, yet when the state undertakes to stamp 

 out the plague, its practice becomes a serious hindrance by increasing 

 and diffusing the virus. 



4. In spite of the difficulty or iujpossibility of controlling the enor. 

 mous cattle traffic which is constantly flowing westward through the 

 center of Europe, and the consequent temptation to adopt measures of 

 repression and restriction rather than those of extinction, the congress 

 declares strongly in favor of the instant slaughter of all diseased ani. 

 mals and of those suspected of disease. How mu(;h more should we 

 who have to deal with but a mere patch of insix'ction relatively to our 

 territory promptly destroy ever}' animal and every herd in which infec- 

 tion is found ? 



5. Even in Europe the veterinary sanitary authorities feel that action 

 by isolated states aiming at the suppression or extinction of lung-plague 

 is wofully ineffective, and they demand that the veterinary sanitary 

 police administration shall overstep the national boundaries and be 

 made continental,, to the extent that the different nations shall agree 

 upon a uniform law, under which the disease shall be promptly stam})edout 



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