CHAPTER XXVI 

 ASIATIC CHOLERA 



Spirillum Cholera Asiatics (Koch*) 



General Characteristics. — A motile, flagellated, non-sporogenous, liquefying, 

 non-chromogenic, non-aerogenic, parasitic and saprophytic, pathogenic, aerobic 

 and optionally anaerobic spirillum, staining by ordinary methods, but not by 

 Gram's method. 



Cholera is a disease endemic in certain parts of India and prob- 

 ably indigenous in that country. Though early mention of it was 

 made in the letters of travelers, and though it appeared in medical 

 literature and in governmental statistics more than a century ago, 

 we find that little attention was paid to the disease, except in its 

 disastrous effect upon the armies, native and European, of India 

 and adjacent countries. The opening up of India by Great Britain 

 in the last century has made scientific observation of the disease 

 possible and has permitted us to determine the relation its epidemics 

 bear to the manners and customs of the people. 



The filthy habits of the Oriental people, their poverty, crowded 

 condition, and peculiar religious customs, are all found to aid in 

 the distribution of the disease. Thus, the city of Benares drains 

 into the Ganges River by a most imperfect system, which distributes 

 the greater part of the sewage immediately below the banks upon 

 which the city is built and along which are the numerous "Ghats" 

 or staircases by which the people reach the sacred waters. It is 

 a matter of religious observance for every zealot who makes a 

 pilgrimage to the "sacred city" to take a bath in and drink a 

 quantity of this sacred but polluted water, and it may be imagined 

 that the number of pious Hindoos who leave Benares with "comma 

 bacilli" in their intestines or upon their clothes must be great, for 

 there are few months in the year when the city is exempt from 

 the disease. 



The pilgrimages and great festivals of both Hindoos and Moslems, 

 by bringing together enormous numbers of people to crowd in close 

 quarters where filth and bad diet prevail, cause a rapid increase in 

 the number of cases during these periods and facilitate the distribu- 

 tion of the disease when the festivals break up. Probably no more 

 favorable conditions for the dissemination of a disease can be imagined 

 than occurs with the return of the Moslem pilgrims from Mecca. 

 The disease extends readily along the regular lines of travel, visiting 

 town . after town, until from Asia it has frequently extended into 



* "Deutsche med. Wochenschrift," 1884-1885, Nos. 19, 20, 37, 38, and 39. 



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