420 dis£:ases of swine 



These questions are best answered by referring the reader to 

 the remarks already made, and those made in a following section 

 upon the subject of Swine Plague. 



Swine plague as an independent disease is a very doubtful en- 

 tity. Personally, I am of the opinion that it rarely, if ever, exists 

 as an independent disease. If it does, it is most certainly only in 

 the form of a few cases scattered here and there, and it never takes 

 on the appearance of a large outbreak, spreading over a wide area 

 of territory and causing the death of a large number of animals. 



Whenever there is an outbreak of some rapidly spreading dis- 

 ease among swine, which travels from one herd to another, caus- 

 ing a large amount of sickness and a large percentage of deaths, you 

 can practically always set it down as a fact that you are dealing 

 with genuine hog-cholera. 



In some of these outbreaks the animals may show more signs 

 of disease affecting the chest than the organs of the abdominal 

 cavity, and when opened up after death the principal changes pro- 

 duced may be found in the lungs, yet you will find that this disease 

 is hog-cholera, and simultaneous or single treatments with a serum 

 of proved strength will check its course and spread. 



The same may be said with reference to the so-called infectious 

 pneumonia which was reported a few years ago from southwestern 

 Iowa and Missouri. Dr. Shore, of the United States Bureau of 

 Animal Industry Station at Ames, Iowa, made an investigation of 

 the "new" disease that had been reported in this section of the 

 country, and found that when the blood from these animals was 

 injected into other healthy hogs it produced a typical form of 

 cholera. It was also found that blood from the animals sick with 

 the "infectious pneumonia," when injected into other hogs which 

 were at the same time given the usual protective dDse of serum, pro- 

 duced no bad effects. This would seem to prove conclusively that 

 the "new" disease was, in reahty, hog-cholera, with perhaps some 

 slight changes in the usual course, and that the use of the serum was 

 effective here the same as it is in other forms of the disease. 



Need for Quarantine Measures. — If the use of the serum 

 method of treating hog-cholera is to be made a success, we must 

 have proper quarantine measures to accompany its use in order to 

 aid in checking the spread of the disease more rapidly than it 



