VOLUNTEERS FOR TRENCH FEVER

Hokitika Guardian, 28 September 1918, Page 1

VOLUNTEERS FOR TRENCH FEVER

CAUSK OP DISEASE FOUND

The disease trench fever, as is well known, has been a scourge of all armies since the present war began. Its ravages have been appalling, and it has been responsible for a high rate of sickness, even though it is not in itself a dangerous disease as far as life is concerned.

31 any efforts were made to cope ■with the disease, but. until recently no success attended them. The Medical Department of the War Office, however, were determined to deal with the matter, and spared no pains to organise research into it —thus continuing a policy which has won for this branch of the Service the esteem and thanks of the whole nation.

Sir David Brnce was asked to form a committee, and gathered about him a number of eminent scientific men. The actual work on the patients was carried out by Major Byam, who, with a staff of experts, went to work at the New End Hospital, Hampstead, commanded by Lieut Colonel T. S. Allan, R.A.M.C. (T.). For the purposes of the work it was necessary that volunteers willing to be infected with the disease should be obtained. It is a matter for pride that no difficulty was met with in tins direction, for as soon as the need was made known many offered their services. “ noixf; SOMETHING.”

Some ol these were ex-Service men whose desire to fight, in the Army or Navy had not been gratified. They declared that at least they would now have a chance of doing something for their country.

How much they were able to do • was made clear ly a paper read by Major Byam, in which he described the brilliant researches cai rie 1 out under him. Li the first place it was suspected that lice were the carriers of this disease. But it soon became clear that the carrying powers of the lice were more complicated than bad been suspected. For example, a man might be bitten by many lice which had previously fed on trench 1 fever patients and yet not get the 1 disease. This fact led Lo the idea that possibly it was the excreta of the lice, and not their bites, which conveyed the disease —the means of entry of the poison being provided by the scratching of the patient. This theory was tested and proved to the hilt. In every case in which lice excreta was scratched into the skin the patients took the disease in a few days. The importance of this is evident when it is remembered that lice abound in the trenches, and their excreta are blown about, as a fnc dust, everywhere. HEAT NOT PREVENTATIVE. It afforded an explanation of the origin of trench fever occurring among persons handling, for example, soldiers’ clothing, and also suggested the possibility of an infection of the civil population a distance from the firing line. Even if no lice were present the excreta remained virulent it brought into contact with cuts or scratches. Again, it was found that for a week after feeding on a trench fever ease a louse was not infected—or rather its excreta were not infective. After a week, however, it became infective, even if it had fed only once on the patient. Probably, therefore, the germ of this disease passes through a part of its life cycle in the body of the louse, as malaria does in the mosquito, and until that period is completed the disease is not spread. The importance of this from the point of view of preventing the spread ot the disease is obvious. Indeed, it was proved that the amount of heat sufficient to kill lice is by no means sufficient to rob the excreta ot its virulence —that is to say, louse-free garments may still be highly infective owing to the excreta contained in them. Among the complications some" times arising out of trench fever under field conditions are “soldier’s heart” and neurasthenia. Major Byam was able to announce that some very important observations on this aspect of the matter had been made and methods of treatment devised. nri wwn