﻿XII. CURATIVE VALUE OP PLAGUE SERUM. 



The opinions of different observers are widely divergent in regard to 

 the action of pest immune serum upon the clinical course of the disease 

 in human beings. Amost all authors agree that in advanced cases of 

 infection the serum is of no value. It is not my purpose here to enter 

 into a complete discussion of this subject. The question has recently been 

 reviewed during the present year (1906) by Dujardin-Beaumetz, 89 by 

 Choksy, 90 and by Terni. 91 In 1905 Bannerman 92 reviewed the question 

 of serum therapy in plague in India and the earlier work has been carefully 

 summarized and considered by Dieudonne. 93 Prom a study of the cases 

 treated and reported in these articles, together with the results obtained 

 from experimentation with animals in the laboratory, there would appear 

 to be little doubt of the value of the serum treatment of plague, provided 

 that the serum is given early enough in the course of the disease. Up 

 to the present time we have not been able to obtain a serum which 

 shows any demonstrable antitoxic value by any known method of pre- 

 paration, since indeed we have been unable to obtain a soluble pest toxin. 

 The work of Markl upon this subject has already been considered on 

 page 184 of this article. 



Besredka's 94 studies upon the endotoxins of typhoid and pest bacilli 

 may be mentioned in connection with the question, but they have not 

 been elaborated further. Terni 95 thought that he was able to prepare 

 an anti-serum which was especially active against the specific pest toxin, 

 by the inoculation of the animal furnishing the serum with peritoneal 

 exudates from guinea pigs dead of pest and with the serum from pest 

 buboes, etc. (natural plague aggressin) . Such a serum he regarded as 

 being better than those sera obtained by the other known methods. 

 However, I have shown (see p. 236)' that the immunity obtained by the 

 injection of natural plague aggressin is not of a different nature from that 

 secured by the inoculation of living pest cultures and that, while inocula- 

 tions of natural plague aggressin produce an immunity greater than that 

 which can be obtained from those of artificial plague aggressin, the 



89 Bull. d. Vinst. Pasteur. (1906), 4, 473. 



90 Report on the Treatment of Plague, Bombay (1906). 

 0l Ztschr. f. Hyg. u. Infectionskranlch. Leipz. (1906), 54, 386. 

 92 Sclent. Mem. Med. Off. India (1905), 20. 



™Handb. d. path. Mik. (Kolle & Wassermann) (1904), 4, 949. 

 94 Ann. d. Vinst. Pasteur (1905), 19, 477. 

 9r> Loc. cit. 



289 



