﻿AN ATYPICAL CASE OF RINDERPEST IN A CARABAO ^ 



By William Hutchins Boynton 

 (From the Veterinary Division,^ Bureau of Agriculture, Manila, P. I.) 



One chart 



In studying the subject of rinderpest in the textbooks one is 

 apt to gain the idea that this affection is infallibly an acute, 

 febrile, infective disease. Descriptions usually state that the 

 first symptom noticeable is a rise of temperature, which appears 

 in from three to five days after infection. Some observers have 

 noticed a rise in temperature as early as from thirty-six to 

 forty-eight hours after infection. The symptoms which follow; 

 such as, a seropurulent discharge from the nostrils and eyes, 

 diarrhoea, loss of appetite, emaciation, and general debility, 

 usually appear in from one to four days after the rise of 

 temperature. 



The more recent periodical literature contains references to 

 the fact that rinderpest occasionally assumes a mild type, be- 

 coming very difficult to recognize. 



Littlewood(i) in Egypt has observed that cattle imported from 

 Asia Minor may not show clinical symptoms and yet at autopsy 

 reveal lesions of rinderpest. 



Rickmann(2), writing of rinderpest in German Southwest 

 Africa, refers to the fact that cattle and other animals may be 

 infected to an imperceptible degree. 



Eggebrecht(3) observed in China, that some animals infected 

 with rinderpest show^no visible signs of the disease beyond a 

 rise in temperature to 40° C. or higher for two days. 



Baldrey(4), describing conditions in India, states that by long 

 residence of any organism of contagious animal disease in one 

 place the disease becomes weakened in virulence to the animals 

 of that place. Thus, animals infected with rinderpest may act 

 as carriers without showing symptoms. 



In the course of work on rinderpest, I encountered a case which 

 yielded some interesting facts regarding mild symptoms and 

 transmissions by both blood injection and by close association. 



Carabao 3235, upon which the observations made in this paper 

 are largely based, was received at the veterinary research labo- 

 ratory at Alabang, Laguna Province, Luzon, for experimental 



* To be published as Bulletin No. 31 of the Bureau of Agriculture of the 

 Government of the Philippine Islands. 

 ' Archibald R. Ward, chief. 



45 



