Tetanus. 357 



of wood, stones, thorns, straw and the Hke can only be considered 

 quite safe after thorough disinfection. It has been shown that 

 the toxin is easily neutralized at the time of infection, whereas, 

 after the disease is developed it will require 1,000 or 100,000 

 times as much antitoxin to produce the same effect. In the case 

 of soiled wounds, therefore, in a valuable animal, a harmless injec- 

 tion of antitoxin or of phenic acid or Iodine solution before the 

 development of tetanic symptoms is not an unwise precaution. A 

 succession of such injections might be given to ward ofE the 

 •disease until after a lapse of time exceeding the short and danger- 

 ous incubation. 



Much more important is the disinfection of the wound itself. 

 All foreign bodies must be removed, but especially those that like 

 fsplinters of wood and straws are likely to harbor the spores of the 

 Taacillus. Then the wound may be thoroughly cauterized ther- 

 mically or chemically, or it may be irrigated with a strong anti- 

 septic solution and then dressed with some agent that will prove 

 •destructive to the spores, and antidotal to the toxin. Strong car- 

 bolic acid may be applied to the whole raw surface including the 

 uttermost recesses of the wound, and after a few seconds or half 

 a minute this may be neutralized by filling the wound with dilute 

 acetic acid or alcohol, after which a dressing of I/Ugol's solution 

 may be applied. I^ambert advises a combination of hydrochloric 

 and carbolic acids. 



Weaker antiseptics, like a 5 per cent, solution of carbolic acid, 

 do more harm than good, as they destroy the pus and saprophytic 

 microbes and even the tetanus bacillus in the wound, without 

 affecting the tetanus spores, which finding no other microbes to 

 contest with them the possession of the field may find themselves 

 in a better position than before to develop into bacilli and cause 

 tetanus. 



Tetanus neonatorum may be certainly prevented by the appli- 

 cation of a disinfectant plaster on the navel at birth. Over 50 

 years ago in Scotland this desideratum was met by applying on 

 the navel of the new-born child a soft and immaculately clean 

 piece of cotton cloth which had just been flamed over a light. 

 On the island of St. Kilda the former mortality of 67.2 per cent, 

 of new-born infants was promptly arrested by dressing the 

 navel daily with iodoform, For new-born animals a cheap and 



