MICROBE OF LANGOUR.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 3778, 10 December 1907, Page 4

MICROBE OF LANGOUR.

The Swiss have long treated “work shyness ” as a disease, but one suspects that they have regarded its medical aspect somewhat lightly. Now, however, it is claimed that the microbe of tiredness has actually been isolated, and in time, possibly, we shall have ‘ ‘ cultures ’ ’ on exhibition in the charitable institutions. The microbe theory was ignored in a paper recently before the Congress on School Hygiene, but Professor Burnham, the author, described experiments which showed how, “ that tired feeling” could be communicated from one animal to another. He contended that the chief cause of fatigue is a toxic product resulting from the functional activity of the muscles, and he said that if the blood of a tired dog was injected into the veins of a normal dog it soon produced symptoms of fatigue. One scientist, working along these lines, is said to have found the fatigue toxin, and then to have made an anti-toxin in the usual manner. This anti-toxin, said Professor Burnham could be made artificially, but it was also produced during normal functional activity. When moderate quantities of the products of fatigue were produced in a healthy organism, there was an increased formation of the specific anti-toxin, so that there was a tendency to develop immunity from fatigue. Experiments with mice supported this theory. While a mouse that had been given a large] dose of the toxin showed decreased ability to work and soon died, mice which beforehand had been rendered immune by treatment with the anti-toxin of fatigue could be given a large dose of the toxin and yet continue to work with unabated efficiency. Men and women were similarly affected. Small doses of the antitoxin stimulated them to work and rendered them temporarily fatigue-proof. Earge doses, however, were dangerous. The normal way to treat children, continued the professor, was to give them short periods of intense work, followed by long rest periods. Prolonged periods of work were likely to cause permanent diminution of the ability to work. Physical energy was at a low ebb in the spring, and on hygienic grounds children should have a short vacation in the spring and a long vacation in the summer.