64 
BACTERIOLOGY. 
Typhoid 
carriers 
Preven¬ 
tion 
Finally, typhoid is spread by what are known as 
carriers, or persons that carry the bacilli in their bodies 
for a long time after they have recovered from the dis¬ 
ease. About 4 per cent, of all typhoid cases become 
carriers. The bacilli may be voided in the urine or 
passed in the stools. Dr. Park tells of a cook who 
was a carrier. During a period of five years she had 
been employed in six different families in which 26 
cases of typhoid fever had developed, all within a 
month after her arrival in each family. From the ex¬ 
perience of recent years the number of typhoid infec¬ 
tions resulting from contact with carriers is much 
greater than was formerly believed. 
To limit the spread of typhoid fever, precautions 
should be taken to render all food materials and water 
free from infection and to destroy the typhoid bacilli 
in all discharges that may contain them. During times 
of epidemics special care should be taken to boil all 
drinking water, to pasteurize all milk to be drunk, and 
to wash all vegetables to be eaten uncooked in boiled 
water. 4 
So far as the destruction of the bacilli in the dis¬ 
charges is concerned the disinfection of the urine and 
stools is of the utmost importance. The stools are 
best disinfected with a 5 per cent, solution of carbolic 
acid. The solid parts should be broken up with a stick 
that can be burned or with a glass rod that can be 
sterilized after using, in order that all parts of the stool 
may come into contact with the disinfecting fluid. 
Stools treated in this way should be allowed to stand 
