ber of cases is that the retesting of cattle within six weeks is not 

 satisfactory, even when a double dose is used, and the temperature 

 taken every two hours from the time of injection until the eighteenth 

 hour. The cases already reported of the retesting of non-lactating 

 dairy cows, indicates that sometimes tubercular cattle will not react 

 to tuberculin on retest even after a period of three months. 



A Search for Tubercle Bacilli in the Circulating Blood of Reacting 



Cattle. 



Considerable interest has been aroused by recent articles claiming 

 that tuberculosis, in all its forms, is a bacteriemia. Rosenberger 4 - 5 

 claims to have found tubercle bacilli in the circulating blood of 300 

 people, some of which were affected with incipient tuberculosis. 

 Petty and Mendenhall 6 and Forsythe 7 claim to have obtained posi- 

 tive results with Rosenberger's technic. The technic employed by 

 Dr. Rosenberger is to draw 5 cc. of venous blood, mix it with an 

 equal amount of 2% sodium citrate in physiological salt solution, in 

 an ordinary test tube. This blood mixture is placed in a refrigerator 

 for twenty-four hours, by which time a reddish sediment will have 

 formed in the bottom of the tube. A portion of this is smeared on a 

 slide, fixed and stained in the usual way. For decolorizing be used 

 Papenheim's solution (1% rosolic acid in absolute alcohol). 



The important bearing of Rosenberger's claims on the bovine 

 tuberculosis problem is evident. From the standpoint of the meat 

 inspector alone, it is of vital importance, and the necessity of verify- 

 ing or refuting Rosenberger's work in so far as it applies to cattle is 

 great. Schroeder, Cotton, and Mohler 8 ' 9 have already published 

 work done on fifty tubercular cattle. They failed utterly to find 

 tubercle bacilli in the blood of these cattle. Failures to find the 

 bacilli in the circulating blood of tubercular humans have been re- 

 ported by Ravenel 10 and Smith, Burnham 11 and Lyons, and 

 Dailey. 12 Attention has been called by Brem 13 and others to the 

 liability of distilled water to contamination with acid-fast bacilli. 



4 Rosenberger, Randall C. The Presence of Tubercle Bacilli in the Circulating 

 Blood in Tuberculosis. American Journal of Medical Science, vol. 137, No. 2, 

 pp. 267-269. Philadelphia, Feb., 1909. 



fi Rosenberger, Randall C. Presence of the Tubercle Bacillus in the Blood. 

 New York Medical Journal, 1909, Ixxxix, 1250. 



B Petty, O. H., and Mendenhall, A. M. Tubercle Bacilli in the Blood. Journal 

 American Medical Association, 1909, liii, 867. 



7 Forsythe, C. E. P. Occurrence of Tubercle Bacilli in the Blood. British 

 Medical Journal, April 24, 1909. 



8 Schroeder, E. C., and Cotton, W. E. Tests Concerning Tubercle Bacilli in 

 the Circulating Blood. U. S. Department of Agriculture; B. A. I. Bulletin 116. 



9 Schroeder, E. C., and Cotton, W. E. Tests Concerning Tubercle Bacilli in 

 the Circulating Blood. The Archives Int. Med., 1909, iv, 133. 



10 Ravenel, M. P., and Smith, K. W. Detection of Tubercle Bacilli in the 

 Blood. Proc. State Med. Soc. of Wisconsin, abst. in Journal American Medical 

 Association, 1909, liii, 649. 



11 Burnham, M. P. Tuberculosis A. Bacteriemia. Journal American Medical 

 Association, 1909, liii, 731. 



12 Dailey, M. A. The Presence of Tubercle Bacilli in the Blood in Tubercu- 

 losis. Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, 1909, clxi, 318. 



13 Brem, W. V. Investigation of Blood for Tubercle Bacilli; Contamination 

 of Distilled Water with Acid-fast Organisms a Source of Error. Journal Amer- 

 ican Medical Association, 1909, liii, 909. 



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