72 THE COMMON SENSE ON THE MILK QUESTION 



quent chapters. It is well known that breast nurslings 

 are remarkably immune from infectious diseases, 

 even though their mothers may be infected during the 

 lactation period.'^ Mothers suffering from typhoid 

 fever, diphtheria, measles, scarlet fever, and many 

 other diseases which are highly infectious, frequently 

 continue nursing their infants without infecting them 

 in the slightest degree. In many isolation hospitals 

 it is the rule not to separate the nursing infant from 

 its mother, even though the mother is suffering from 

 such a disease as diphtheria and the infant is perfectly 

 healthy. Professor Roger, an eminent French author- 

 ity, has published a list of forty-nine cases of nursing 

 mothers admitted with their infants to his isolation 

 hospital. Fifteen had measles, nineteen scat-let fever, 

 eight tonsilitis, one diphtheria, five erysipelas, and one 

 mumps. With the exception of one very debilitated 

 child, who contracted erysipelas, no child contracted 

 disease, notwithstanding that all were suckled by their 

 mothers.^' It is believed that this immunity of breast- 

 fed babies from infectious disease is due to the fact 

 that the mother's milk carries into the infant's body 

 certain protective anti-toxins which are called, in the 

 technology of the laboratory, "anti-bodies." 



When an animal is attacked by poisonous bacteria, 

 certain neutralizing qualities are formed in the blood, 

 which, to a certain degree, produce an active resistant 

 against the poison. In a healthy animal the blood 



