328  Anmial  Report  for  1909  of  Royal  Veterinary  College. 
Great  Britain,  although  when  properly  carried  out  they  are 
admirable  as  a means  of  checking  its  extension  when  an  out- 
break occurs.  Probably  nothing  short  of  the  prohibition 
of  the  importation  of  feeding-stiiffs  and  manures  from  a 
considerable  number  of  the  countries  from  which  the  supplies 
of  these  materials  are  at  present  drawn  would  effect  any 
notable  reduction  in  the  total  annual  outbreaks,  and  it  may 
safely  be  said  that  such  a remedy  would  be  more  costly  than 
the  disease. 
Anthrax  bacilli  in  milk. — The  question  whether  in  cases 
of  anthrax  in  cows  the  bacilli  are  usually  present  in  the  milk 
is  obviously  one  of  considerable  interest  from  a public  health 
point  of  view.  Reasoning  from  the  fact  that  in  fatal  cases  of 
anthrax  in  cattle  the  bacilli  are  always  more  or  less  abundant 
in  the  blood  everywhere,  one  would  naturally  expect  that  in 
many,  if  not  all,  such  cases  some  of  the  bacilli  must  find  their 
way  into  the  udder,  but  there  is  no  recorded  instance  in  which 
the  presence  of  the  bacilli  has  been  proved  in  milk  taken  from 
the  live  subject. 
On  three  occasions  during  the  last  two  years  milk  withdrawn 
post-mortem  from  cows  that  had  died  of  anthrax  was  sent  to 
the  Laboratory,  and  in  each  of  these  cases  the  bacilli  were  so 
numerous  that  they  could  readily  be  detected  on  microscopic 
examination  of  an  ordinary  stained  cover-glass  preparation 
made  from  the  milk. 
At  first  sight  this  may  be  thought  to  indicate  a very  serious 
danger  to  human  beings,  and  to  justify  the  enforcement  of 
rigorous  measures  to  avert  the  danger  when  anthrax  breaks  out 
in  a herd  of  dairy  cows.  In  reality  one  finds  that  that  is  the 
view 'sometimes  taken  by  medical  officers  of  health  and  acted 
upon  by  the  local  authorities  whom  they  advise,  with  the 
result  that  an  attempt  is  made  to  enforce  restrictions  which  are 
not  sanctioned  by  the  Anthrax  Order.  In  truth,  however,  the 
danger  in  this  connection  is  not  great,  and  precautions  which 
are  in  no  way  oppressive  for  the  farmer  or  dairyman  can  be 
relied  upon  to  prevent  the  infection  of  human  beings  by  means 
of  the  milk.  In  the  first  place,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the 
question  is  not  whether  the  milk  present  in  the  udder  of  a cow 
dying  or  already  dead  from  anthrax  contains  the  bacilli,  but 
whether  in  the  ordinary  circumstances  of  an  outbreak  the 
bacilli  are  likely  to  be  present  in  the  milk  withdrawn  from  any 
of  the  cows.  It  is  probable  that  in  every  fatal  case  of  anthrax 
in  a milch  cow  the  bacilli  are  present  in  the  milk  within  the 
udder  at  the  time  of  death,  but  it  is  also  probable  that  the  milk 
invasion  does  not  occur  until  the  bacilli  have  begun  to  multiply 
in  the  circulating  blood,  and  it  is  well  known  that  that  is  an 
event  which  usually  precedes  death  by  only  an  hour  or  two,  or 
