FERTILITY 647 



herd. During recent years contagious sterility has been very 

 common in Switzerland and Germany, and there is evidence of its 

 existence in England. Antiseptic disinfection is useful, but 

 experience has shown that even when treated infectious vaginitis 

 often runs a prolonged course. Nevertheless, a complete cure 

 usually takes place after some months, this recovery being indicated 

 by the cessation of the muco-purulent discharge and the recurrence 

 at normal intervals of the cestrous periods.^ 



Deficient, excessive, or unfavourable nutrition, change of 

 environment, in-breeding, etc., as sources of infertility, have been 

 already discussed. (For persistence of corpus luteum as a cause see 

 p. 373.) 



Sterility may also be induced experimentally in animals by 

 drugs or toxic substances. Eats treated with alcohol show, abnormal 

 sperm formation or atrophy of the seminiferous tubules. Guinea- 

 pigs similarly treated have smaller litters and degenerate young. 

 After administering thorium to newts the fertilised ova only 

 partially develop.^ Quinine sulphate when fed to laying ring-doves 

 reduces the amount of yolk in the egg besides decreasing the 

 deposition of albumen,^ and other instances of a similar kind might 

 be quoted, illustrating the susceptibility of the reproductive organs 

 to the action of abnormal substances. . 



Abtifici-al Insemination as a Means of Overcoming Sterility 



Artificial insemination as a means of overcoming certain forms 

 of sterility has been employed by various medical men from Hunter's 

 time downwards. In the case treated by Hunter himself,* tlie 

 husband of the woman experimented upon was affected with 

 hypospadias. The semen was injected into the vagina, conception 

 followed, and a child was afterwards born. Sims ^ recorded a case of 

 a woman who suffered from dysmenorrhcEa and a deformed uterus, 

 and who had been married for nine years without having children. 

 Artificial insemination was resorted to, pregnancy ensued, and a child 

 was born in due time. Numerous other eases are cited by Heape ^ 

 and Iwanoff,'' to whose papers the reader is referred for bibliographies 

 of the subject. 



' McFadyean, "Sterility in Cows,'' Jour. Royal Agric. Soc, v6l. Ixx., 1909. 



2 See Hammond, loc. ait., 1921. 



3 Riddle and Anderson, "Studies on the Physiology of Eeproduction in 

 Birds," VIII., Amer. Jour, of PliysM., vol. xlvii., 1918. 



* This case is described -by Home, Phil. Trans., 1799. (See p. 176, 

 Chapter V.) 



^ Sims, Notes Oliniques sur la Chirv,rgie Uterine, Paris, 1866. 



8 Heape, "The Artificial Insemination of Mammals, etc.," Proc. Boy. Soc, 

 vol. Ixi., 1897. 



■ ' iwanoff, "De la F^condation artiflcielle chez les Mammifferes," Arcfi. des 

 Sciences Biologiqwes, vol. xii., 1907. 



