52 ILLINOIS STATE DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION. 



be tolerated, even when the animals are only slightly diseased. 

 Among the contagious diseases to which cows are not liable, but 

 which may be spread by milk, the most common are perhaps 

 scarlet fever, typhoid fever and diphtheria, also measles, small- 

 pox and chickenpox. Statistics show that milk is often the cause 

 of an epidemic of such contagious diseases, and not infrequently 

 a serious epidemic may be traced from a single farm. 



Last fall at Elgin, several typhoid fever cases had been 

 reported to the Health Officer and in his investigation he found 

 that several of them were patrons of the same milk man. He 

 went to the milk dealer's place and found that his wife was just 

 recovering from a case of typhoid fever. Of course, they stopped 

 his entire route at once. They further investigated and found 

 that the water from his well was full of typhoid germs. That 

 was where his wife had gotten it and between her handling the 

 utensils and washing them with the water from this contami- 

 nated well, the milk was contaminated. The bacteria causing 

 these diseases frequently get into milk from contaminated water 

 or from persons who have been exposed to the disease and who 

 handle the milk. For this reason no water which is not above 

 suspicion should be used around the dairy or anywhere else, for 

 either drinking or washing, and no person who has been ex- 

 posed to such disease should be around the cow, the milk or the 

 milk utensils. 



Last month Mr. Sam Shilling and myself made addresses 

 at some dairymen's meetings in Southern Illinois and while at 

 Highland, Illinois, I had the pleasure of meeting Prof. Patrick, 

 formerly of the University at Ames, Iowa, and for some years 

 past connected with the Bureau of Chemistry of the Bureau of 

 Agriculture. Mr. Patrick was at Highland attending to some 

 investigations for his department. We rode into East St. Louis 

 together and he related to me an incident that will illustrate 

 what we have been talking about. A year or so ago, an epidemic 

 of typhoid fever occurred in Georgetown, a suburb of Washing- 

 ton, D. C. Investigation by the authorities showed that most 

 of these cases were on the route of one milk peddler. They 

 traced back to this peddler's place and no one was affected there 



