494 DIPHTHERIA IN FOWLS 



which run a rapidly fatal course. It appears that it is such 

 outbreaks which have been reported in Europe as diphtheria 

 and not the low form of chronic inflammation which has been 

 studied in this country. 



§ 381. Differential diagnosis. The differential diag- 

 nosis of diphtheria in fowls cannot be made until we are pos- 

 sessed of a knowledge of its cause. At present all affections 

 of the head characterized by the range of lesions admitted by 

 the description of the morbid anatomy are accepted as cases of 

 diphtheria or roup. Chicken pox is separated by the nodular 

 character of the lesions. Manson's eye worm (oxyspirura 

 Mansoni) of chickens produces lesions that might be mistaken 

 for roup. The finding of this worm would determine the 

 diagnosis. 



§ 382. Relation of diphtheria in man to that in fowls. 

 A comparison of the bacillus of diphtheria in man (Klebs- 

 LoefBer) with those described from diphtheria in fowls shows 

 that morphologically and in their pathogenesis for experimen- 

 tal animals the organisms are in no way alike. There is also 

 a marked difference in the nature of the exudates in fowls and 

 in man. The non-identity of these diseases has been clearly 

 pointed out by Menard.* Although these maladies are shown 

 by several observers to be unlike in their etiology and the 

 character of their lesions, the transmission of fowl diphtheria 

 to the human species, and vice versa, is affirmed by several 

 writers. 



Gerhardt reports 4 cases of diphtheria in Wesselhausen , 

 Baden, among 6 workmen who had charge of several thousand 

 fowls, many of which died of diphtheria. There were no 

 other ca.ses of diphtheria in the neighborhood and the evidence 

 was quite conclusive that the disease was contracted from the 

 affected fowls. 



Debrie;]; reports briefly the transmission of human diph- 



*Revue d'Hygiene. Tome XII (1890), p. 410. 



t Reviewed in Centralblatt f. Bakteriologie. Bd. XIII (1893), 

 S. 730. 



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