CONTAGIOUS DISEASES OF DOxMESTICATED ANIMALS. 273 



ropean hogs generally are infected in a much larger proportion than is 

 at present admitted. 



In some parts of Europe rats seem to have been examined more care- 

 fully than pigs ; thus in Saxony one-half of the rats from flayers con- 

 tain trichinte, and 20 per cent, of all those caught are similarly infected; 

 in Moravia sixteen out of one lot of twenty rats were infected, nine of 

 a second lot of twelve were infected, seven of a third lot of eight were 

 infected. In Klederling, a suburb of Vienna, seven out of forty-seven, 

 and at Untermeidling two out of thirty-one were infected.* In France, 

 where the authorities now deny the existence of trichinie]except as im- 

 ported, and where one of the reasons for prohibiting American pork is 

 the alleged fear of scattering this parasite over the country ,t the only 

 outbreak of trichiniasis on record was caused by the flesh of a native 

 hog ; and the rats from the ditches and sewers of Paris, examined by 

 Drs. Gou jon and Legros, were infected in very large proi^ortion ; one 

 lot of thirty-two contained three with trichinae, and of seventy-two rats, 

 five were full of these parasites.| 



EFFECT OF THE CURING PROCESS ON THE TRICHINAE. 



If we adnjit that about 2 per cent, of American hogs contain trichi- 

 nae, it becomes a matter of the greatest importance for us to inquire 

 into the condition of the parasite after it has been subjected to the ac- 

 tion of salt a sufficient time to enable the pork to be carried from the 

 packing-houses in this country to the consumers abroad. And here the 

 effect on the consumers is entitled to more weight as a matter of evidence 

 than those scientific experiments which are simply designed to prove the 

 life of the parasite; for the trichina may sometimes still l)e living but 

 not have sufficient vitality to develop and reproduce itself. Such trichi- 

 nae would be perfectly harmless even though the pork were eaten with- 

 out previous cooking. 



In France it is said in the report of Academy of Medicine of Paris, 

 that 95,000,000 kilograms or 200,000,000 pounds of American pork pro- 

 ducts had been consumed from 1870 to 1S81 without causing a single 

 case of disease. And notwithstanding the fact that large quantities of 

 such pork have been consumed for a number of years, the one outbreak 

 of trichiniasis at Crepy, which was clearly traced to a French hog, is 

 the only instance of the appearance of this disease among people that 

 is recorded in that country. 



In Germany, where it is the habit of the people to eat pork without 

 cooking, trichiniasis among people is common, and it has been very 

 frequently asserted in some quarters that many of these cases were due 

 to American pork. During the recent terrible epidemic at Emersleben 

 and neigiiboring towns, Ur. Brouardel, of the Paris Academy of Medi- 



* Dr. Glazier, Report on Trichinaj and Trichiniasis, Washington, 1881. 

 tj. ChaTiii, Trichino et Trichinose, p. 15:5, foot-note. 

 {Tht'se <le Paris, ldi56, au'l Davaiuo, Tniit<5 clos Eutozoaires, p. 755. 

 5751 D A 18 



