26o PATHOGENIC BACTERIA IN MILK 



ever perfect, can adequately recount the history of milk epidemics. 

 There can be no doubt that the unrecorded and unrecognised cases 

 in which milk has acted as the vehicle of contagion, are legion. 



It is only since 1857 that attention has been drawn to this 

 channel of infection. In that year, Dr Michael Taylor of Penrith, 

 in the ordinary course of his practice, came across a number of 

 cases of typhoid fever which had only one thing in common, 

 namely, a community of milk supply. Briefly, it appears that 

 about the beginning of September 1857, a young servant girl, E. 

 O., returned home to Penrith from Liverpool suffering from 

 typhoid fever. The family of which she was a member consisted 

 of father, mother, and five children, of whom she was the eldest. 

 The cottage in which they lived consisted of two ill-ventilated and 

 ill-lighted rooms, a kitchen or sitting-room, and a bedroom open- 

 ing out of it. The father possessed three cows, and carried on 

 a small milk business dealing with some fourteen families. The 

 mother milked the cows, and the milk was brought into the kitchen 

 direct from the byre, and in due course distributed in tin measures 

 amongst the customers. After her return home the girl continued 

 ill for about a fortnight, during which period she was nursed by 

 her mother in the kitchen or common sitting-room. At the end 

 of the fourth week in September she was convalescent, and began 

 to help at once in the distribution of the milk. Two other children 

 of the family sickened and passed through the fever. The mother 

 nursed all three patients, and continued to milk the cows and 

 attend to the distribution of the milk. In October and November 

 some thirteen cases of typhoid fever occurred in seven families 

 dealing with the infected cottage, and from these primary cases a 

 large number of persons, over a wide area, were infected by contact. 

 By most careful observation and reasoning, Dr Taylor arrived at 

 the conclusion that the milk became contaminated in the kitchen 

 of this cottage, from the typhoid patients there being nursed.^ 



Dr Taylor's views were accepted with considerable hesitation 

 and reserve, and no further milk-borne epidemics of note are 

 recorded for ten years. But in 1867 a second outbreak occurred in 

 Penrith, and, fortunately, Dr Taylor was again able to carry out the 

 necessary investigations. On this occasion the disease was scarlet 

 fever. In April of that year there were a few cases, amongst them 

 a child of J. C, aged four months. After an illness of two or three 

 weeks the child died during the period of desquamation. In the 

 cottage where the child was nursed and where it died a small milk 

 ^ Edin. Med. Jour.^ 1858, pp. 993-1004. 



