THE PHILIPPINb 



Journal of Science 



B. Medical Sciences 



Vol. VI OCTOBER, 1911 No. 4" 



A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF THE AMOEB/E IN THE 



MANILA WATER SUPPLY, IN THE INTESTINAL 



TRACT OF HEALTHY PERSONS, AND IN 



AMOEBIC DYSENTERY. 



By Ernest Linwood Walkee. 

 {From the Biological Laboratory, Bureau of Science, Manila, P. I.) 



The etiologic relation of amoebae to endemic dysentery, while not 

 established upon all of the postulates of Koch, is supported by clinical, 

 pathologic, and experimental evidence and has become generally ac- 

 cepted; but, notwithstanding the attention these parasites have received 

 in recent years, investigators are not agreed upon how many species are 

 parasitic in the intestinal tract of man, whether they are obligatory 

 parasites or whether amoebae from water or other external sources are 

 capable of colonizing in the human intestine, their cultivability on 

 artificial media, and the species concerned in the production of amoebic 

 dysentery. 



The importance of these questions at issue is evident. They concern 

 not only clinical and preventive medicine, but involve important financial 

 considerations as well. The correct microscojjic diagnosis of, and the 

 application of early treatment to, amoebic dysentery depends upon our 

 ability to identify the pathogenic amoeba; and the requirement for 

 radically different prophylactic measures as well as the necessity for 

 large expenditures to distil, fUter, or otherwise treat water from uncon- 

 taminated supplies in the Tropics so as to kill or remove the amoebae 

 which such water always contains depend upon whether or not the 

 pathogenic amoeba is an obligatory parasite. 



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