YELLOW FEVER 229 



Health Association, April, 1896), devised an ingenious and 

 apparently very successful method of treatment founded on 

 the well-known general principles on which all sero-thera- 

 peutic treatments are based. His theory is that the im- 

 munising properties present in the blood of convalescent 

 patients are to be found in the urine, which he uses by 

 preference as it is comparatively easily obtained, while it 

 would be rather a questionable proceeding to draw any- 

 thing like large quantities of blood from a patient just 

 recovering from yellow fever. This theory receives con- 

 firmation from the work of M. Bouchard, who states (in a 

 paper read at the International Medical Congress at Berlin, 

 1890) that he has found the urine of immunised animals to 

 possess immunising properties similar to those found in 

 their blood serum. Dr. Carmona injects from 2 to 4 c.c. of 

 the urine of a convalescent patient taken between the fourth 

 and fourteenth day of the disease. For convenience the 

 urine may be evaporated on a water-bath, and the residue 

 dissolved in water as required. Dr. Carmona cites pver a 

 thousand cases of the employment of his method, in none of 

 which did any evil consequences follow the injection, while 

 in only very few cases have inoculated persons been subse- 

 quently attacked by yellow fever. As Dr. Carmona points 

 out, an absolute immunity could hardly be expected : he 

 gives vaccination as a parallel, in which the protection 

 against small-pox, although great, is not absolute. Though 

 he does not claim at present that the technique he employs 

 is necessarily perfect, he has certainly justified his conten- 

 tion that physicians practising in districts where yellow 

 fever is rife should give this process a trial. 



OTHER PATHOGENIC ORGANISMS. 



A large number of organisms have been described as the 

 cause of other diseases in man, among which may be 



