The Manawatu Herald. Saturday, March 4, 1916. INFANTILE PARALYSIS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1518, 4 March 1916, Page 2

The Manawatu Herald. Saturday, March 4, 1916. INFANTILE PARALYSIS.

In view of the fyct that there are five cases of infantile paralysis in this district, three in the borough and two at Himatangi, it behoves every one to take reasonable precautions against the spread of the epidemic. The health officers consider that the epidemic will subside when the weather becomes cooler. Drains and sanitary pans should be well disinfected and all rubbish and decaying vegetation burnt and the health of the children carefully watched. Up to the present, the cause of the disease is baffling the medical authorities. An Otago Daily Times reporter asked Professor Champtaloup on Tuesday if he considered there was anything in the suggestion that children visiting the seaside ran the risk of being infected with the germs of infantile paralysis through the medium of a bite from a sandfly. Professor Champtaloup said that that suggestion had already been made by a doctor in Nelson, and that he had telegraphed to Auckland for the purpose of obtaining information which might better enable him to form an opinion on the theory. He had experience in Otago on the occasion of the last outbreak there about two years ago, and that hardly supported such a theory, as in a number of cases there was no doubt that the children had not been in any locality where they could have been bitten by sandflies. Professor Champtaloup said it was wellknown, however, that sandflies were responsible for the spread of other diseases. In the evening Professor Champtaloup received a reply to his telegram to Auckland, conveying the information that there was nothing in the outbreak of the disease which bad occurred there to lead doctors to consider there was anything in the theory put forward. The fact that amongst the earlier cases a great number had visited the beaches would be only a natural coincidence, seeing that in January and February large numbers of people with their children are in the habit of holiday-making on the seashore, Mr C. B. Morris, president of the Canterbury Microscopical Society, has had a tiny inconspicuous dark coloured fly, which frequents the sea beaches at New Brighton and Sumner, under inspection for some time, and is convinced that it is the carrier ot the germ which causes infantile paralysis (says the Lyttelton Times). The fly, scientifically, is Coelopa littoralis. It is known to New Zealand entomologists, and is closely related to the stable-fly of England and to another fly, which, after Mr Morris began his investigations, was accused in America of being the probable agent in transmitting the disease in Massachusetts. Under Mr Morris’s microscopic lens, this little insect has a very formidable appearance. It has a curved fang adapted lor biting, and, compared wilh its fragile body and innocent appearance, can give a very severe bite. Mr Morris, in his microscopical work, was watching for the carrier of the disease for some time. Ultimately, he concentrated

all his attention on Coelopa Httoralis. This year he began to observe it fairly early- A few weeks ago, no signs of it could be found at New Brighton or Sumner. Last week it was plentiful at Sumner, and then the first case of infantile paralysis in Canterbury was reported, the victim coming from that resort. Mr Morris is satisfied that the simultaneous appearance of the fly and the disease in this part of New Zealand is not a mere coincidence. The fly frequents pieces of kelp on the beach, and lays its eggs there. The kelp usually contains dead shell fish and other decaying matter, on which the germs may live. As a matter of speculation, it is thought that the germs could be brought to New Zealand by some sea borne carcase, swept up on the beach by an ocean current. From there the germs, which probably are parasites, would be taken by the fly, and soon would bespiead broadcast by inoculation. Children like to play about the kelp that lies on the beaches. The flies swarm on their naked limbs, and the transmission ot the disease by biting is a simple matter. Efforts to find a stain that will show the germ on a microscopic slide have not been successful at present, but both Mr Morris and Dr. Pearson, Bacteriologist at the Christchurch General' Hospital, are working in this direction, and hope to obtain some definite results soon. Mr Morris feels that, from a scientific point of view, it would be advisable to continue his observations quietly and to watch the development of cases, but he thinks that as the disease is so deadly and the results so terrible to childlife, the proper course is to publish all the knowledge in his possession at the present time, in order that precautions may be taken. Amongst these, he suggests the burning and burying of kelp that lies on the beaches near centres of population. Mr Morris agrees with investigators at the Rockefeller Institute, America, that the house-fly should be exonerated from the charge of carrying the disease, because it does not bite. The disease has been recognised by medical men for about fifty years. Dr. Noguchi, a member of the institute, is trying to discover whether the fly in America related to the New Zealand fly is the- only means by which the disease is carried. In the meantime, Mr Morris puts forth the results of his investigations, as far as they have gone, in the hope that they will act as a warning.