182 HOW PLANTS BENEFIT AND HARM MANKIND 



water was used to wash the milk cans. Once in the milk, the bac- 

 teria multiplied rapidly, so that the milkman gave out cultures of 

 typhoid in his milk bottles. Proper safeguarding of our water and 

 milk supply is necessary if we are to keep typhoid away. 



'Tetanus, or Blood Poisoning. — The bacterium causing blood 

 poisoning is another toxin-forming germ. It lives in the earth and 

 enters the body through cuts or bruises. It seems to thrive best 

 in less oxygen than is found in the air. It is therefore important 

 not to close up with court-plaster wounds in which such germs may 

 have found lodgment. It, with typhoid, is responsible for four 

 times as many deaths as bullets and shells in time of battle. The 

 wonderfully small death rate of the Japanese army in their war with 

 Russia was due to the fact that the Japanese soldiers always boiled 

 their drinking water before using it, and their surgeons always 

 dressed all wounds on the battlefield, using powerful antiseptics in 

 order to kill any bacteria that might find lodgment in the exposed 

 wounds. 



Other Diseases. — • Many other diseases have been traced to 

 bacteria. Diphtheria is one of the best known. As it is a throat 

 disease, it may easily be conveyed from one person to another by 

 kissing, putting into the mouth objects which have come in con- 

 tact ^^^th the mouth of the patient having diphtheria, or by food 

 into which the germs have been carried. Another disease which 

 probably causes more misery in the world than any other germ 

 disease is syphilis. It is estimated that 80 per cent of blindness 

 in newborn children is due to this cause. Grippe, pneumonia, 

 whooping cough, and colds are believed to be caused by bacteria. 

 Other diseases, as malaria, yellow fever, sleeping sickness, and 

 probably smallpox, scarlet fever, and measles, are due to the 

 attack of one-celled animal parasites. Of these we shall learn 

 later in the chapter on Protozoa. 



J Methods of fighting Germ Diseases. — As we have seen, dis- 

 eases produced by bacteria may be caused by the bacteria being 

 transferred from one person directly to another, or the disease may 

 obtain a foothold in the body from food, water, by breathing in the 

 germs in the air, or by taking them into the blood through a cut or 

 a wound or a body opening. 

 It is evident that as individuals we may each do something to 



