FURTHER STUDIES ON THE BACILLUS BRONCHICANIS, THE 
CAUSE OF CANINE DISTEMPER.* 
By N. S. Ferry, M.D., Detroit, Mich. 
In the American Veterinary Review, July, 1910, I pub¬ 
lished an article on the bacterial findings in canine distemper, in 
which I was the first to describe an organism proven by me to 
be the primary cause of the disease. At that time I reported the 
results of my investigation, covering over two years, and showed 
that I had isolated an organism differing from any previously de¬ 
scribed. Since the publication of this article it has been found 
that a disease due to this organism may be more widespread 
among animals than had been thought. It was known, of course, 
that all animals suffered with a disease simulating distemper, and 
many observers have believed that the infection could be carried 
from one species to another, but up to the time of the publication 
of the above-mentioned article no organism had been described 
which proved to be specific. In this article the organism was de¬ 
scribed in detail, so that no one would have had any difficulty in 
recognizing it after its isolation. Later, in June, 1911, in the 
Journal of Infectious Diseases, I described in more detail the ex¬ 
periments mentioned in my first article, and gave the name Bacil¬ 
lus bronchicanis to the organism. 
With several strains of this organism a vaccine was made, and, 
in order to prove its efficiency for therapeutic, as well as prophy¬ 
lactic, purposes, it was tested out on a large number of dogs and 
in a few instances on other animals, such as the Canadian lynx, 
sea lion, fox, etc. The returns from these experiments were 
very favorable, and well corroborated our own work, which had 
# From the Research Laboratory of Parke, Davis & Co., Detroit, Mich. 
77 
