486 



Typhoid Fever 



be found in water, air, soiled clothing, dust, sewage, milk, 

 etc., contaminated directly or indirectly with the intestinal 

 discharges of diseased persons. 



The bacillus is also occasionally present upon green 

 vegetables sprinkled with polluted water, and epidemics are 

 reported in which the infection was traced to oysters infected 

 through sewage. Newsholme * found that in 56 cases of 

 typhoid fever about one-third were attributable to eating 

 raw shell-fish from sewage-polluted beds. The bacillus 

 occasionally enters milk in water used to dilute it or to 

 wash the cans. 



Fig. 149. Bacillus typhi. 



Morphology. The organism is a short, stout bacillus, 

 about 1-3 fi. (2-4 p. Chantemesse, Widal) in length and 

 0.5-0. 8 fi. broad (Sternberg). The ends are rounded, and 

 it is exceptional for the bacilli to be united in chains. The 

 size and morphology vary with the nature of the culture 

 medium and the age of the culture. Thoinot and Masselin,f 

 in describing these morphologic variations, point out that 

 when grown in bouillon the typhoid bacillus is very slender; 

 in milk it is stouter; upon agar-agar and potato it is thick 



*"Brit. Med. Jour.," Jan., 1895. 

 f "Precis de Microbie," Paris, 1893. 



