LETTERS TO EDITOR TOXIN-ANTITOXIN FATALITIES

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 118, 16 February 1928, Page 11

LETTERS TO EDITOR

TOXIN-ANTITOXIN FATALITIES

-Sir, —The news of the p Nl tlis of twelve children in Buudaberg, Queensland, after being inoculated with toxin auti-toxin, must causa a feeling of great uneasiness in the minds of many parents, and create a sense of real prejudice against its use. In The Dominion of January 31 Dr. Watt is quoted as saying: “Many millions of children in all parts of the world have beeu immunised by toxin antitoxin without harmful effects, but some years ago, in the early clays of the treatment, there were fatalities in America and Vienna. That in America was due to the mixture having been put in a freezer, and that in Vienna to faulty graduation of the proportion of antitoxin in the mixture. There have been no group fatalities of that sort for several years.” Now, if is only fair that the public should become conversant with both sides of a question which so intimately concerns the welfare of the children of our country, and I propose to make as clear a statement as possible, without taking up too much space. John Stuart Mill has truly sajd that he who knows only his own side of a case knows very little about that, and I feel sure that the people of New Zealand are not in the same category as the old lady spoken of by Sidney Smith who did not want io know the other side of a question in case she might be prejudiced. Diphtheria anti-toxin has been in use since 1595, i.e., over a period of 33 years, and it was in 191!), twenty-four years later, that the fatalities referred to took place. In Dallas, Texas, ten children died, 40 who survived were in a pitiable state, in some cases so emaciated that practically no flesh was left on their bones. No cause could be ascribed for this socalled faulty mixture, but all that had been distributed was recalled.

Again, in 1921, many pupils of Concord Academy, Mass., were confined to their beds suffering severely after inoculation. The doctor responsible said he could only attribute this "untoward reaction” to the fact that the anti-toxin had become poisonous owing to the zero weather (not to having been put m a freezer as stated by Dr. Watt/. In this same year six babies died suddenly at a clinic in Baden, Austria, after inoculation with this serum, since when its use has been forbidden in Austria. Our Health Department states that anti-toxin has proved itself safe, but it is a well-established fact that, to childrcnof asthmatic tendencies, it is a grave danger. It has been admitted, too. by the Health Department that no individual examination of children takes place before inoculation, in order to ascertain whether there .may he any danger from the operation or not. We are told that the written consent of parents is always obtained, and that when the benefits of this prophylaxis are explained, they (the parents) readily give their consent. That this is not the case can be pioved by the writer, and instances given where the children were inoculated without even the verbal consent of parents. We are also assured by the Health Department that no compulsion is used to make parents consent to this treatment. but I contend that the worst form of compulsion is employed in that the fears of such parents are first aroused by picturing the ravages of the disease, and then this alleged preventive is offered to them. Many eminent doctors hare placed on record that paralysis, skin diseases, and epilepsy have followed the use of this serum, and the following extract from the standard work of Drs. Bosanquet and Eyre confirms this: "It cannot bo denied that in a certain number of instances the injection of diphtherical anti-toxin has been followed by death, directly attributable to the action of the serum. A melancholy instance of this was afforded in the sudden death of Professor Langerhans’s infant son soon after a prophylactic dc ; e of the serum, but this has been attributed to the existence in the child of the status lymphaticus. which predisposes t 0 death from trivial causes. A similar case of sudden death is recorded by Boone in a boy aged 10 years who, after an injection of 4000 sinits of anti toxin, suddenly sat up, clutched at his "hroat, became deeply. cyanosed. and died. No cause of death was discovered at the necropsy.” Dr. Elkington, Director of Tropical Hygiene in the Commonwealth Health Department, in commenting on the deaths of the Queensland children, said the case was utterly abnormal, and that no similar instance, as far as he is aware, has been recorded anywhere, despite the use of this method in many hundreds of thousands of cases in all parts of the world. Dr. Earle Pago, ’"ho has gone to Bundaberg to investigate the position, in referring to the anti-toxin treatment, and the wonderful benefits it has conferred, goes on to say that the death rate per Thousand was practically as great as ever it had been, the general treatment having failed to arrest the disease. "While there is so much disagreement among the medical profession about this serum, and so many instances of the dancers arising frrm its use. parents would be well advised to adopt a "go slow” policy with regard Io any overtures to have their child"ep inoculated with what has been described as a "safe and rc’iable” remedy.—l am, etc.. M.W. Wellington, January 31. Sir,—ls inoculation against diphtheria of any use or is it just forced upon a trusting public? According to the Medical Health Officer of New South Wales, vide the New Zealand Press of Monday last, inoculation was carried on "successfully" tor the past 20 years, and he adds naively that, notwithstanding the great immunisation of the children through all those years, the death rate per 1000 is still the same. Just imagine it, for 20 years they have inoculated the little ones —for the grand result of having the same mortality per 1000 as they had 20 years ago.—l am, etc. A PARENT. Masterton February 1.