TYPHOID VACCINE.
" MAKING GOOD " ITS CLAIMS. ' Vawination against typhoid fever is ntiidly making a 'place for itself among the modern therapeutic methods of assured value. Ever since 1896, when Sir A. E. Wright, (then,' plain Major Wright cf the Army Medical School at Neltey) announced his first use of such a vaccine, in the London Lancet, the possibility of ■practioaUy eliminating typhoid fever from'the mortality returns has been in the air. 1
Dr. Wright's treatment went through various vicissitudes in its early yearswas tried on British soldiers in India; derided as absurd and dangerous by certain British surgeons, its use abandoned among the soldiers as a result of this clamor, and then in 1904 again adopted in response to the recommendations of a special typhoid commission. Tt was used with success during the Herrero campaign of the Germans in 1904. In 1908 the medical officers of the United States Army experienced a belated awakening to the importance of the Wright vaccine, and arrangements were made for testing it in the army, The results of.this work to date—from February, 1909., when the actual innoculations were begun—are set forth toy ■Major F; F. Russell in the Johns Hopkins Hospital Bulletin for March. They strongly support the claims made by Dr. Wright and Colonel Leishman, who now has charge of the military vaccinations in India, and seem to leave little doubt as to the value and safety of the method. Major Russell sums up his conclusions as follows:
"1. Vaccination against typhoid undoubtedly protects to a very great extent against the disease. "2. It is an indispensable adjunct to other phrophylaxis among troops and others exposed to infection. _ "3 It is very doubt nil if there is an| increase of susceptibility following inoculation. "4. Vaccination during the disease, for therapeutic purposes, fails to reveal any evidence of a negative phase. "5. The statement that vaccination should not be carried out in the presence of an epidemic is not justified 'by the fart? at hand.
'•6. The procedure is easily carried out, and only exceptionally does it .provoke severe general reactions. "7. 'No untoward results have occurred in this series of 3040 vaccinations." The vaccine consists of the dead bodies of typhoid germs killed by heat. Each cubic centimetre (one-fifth of a teaspoonfui) of the vaccine contains 1,000,000,000 bacilli. Three vaccinations are usually given, separated by an interval of some clays. In an ice-box the vaccine ■will keep perfectly for at least fifteen months, perhaps very much longer. The length of the protection afforded by vaccination is uncertain. Judging from the British records, it cannot be less than three years. These army tests are of much "greater interest and importance than those carried on in lay hospitals, because of the greater num'ber of inoculations upon which the conclusions are based. '
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Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 75, 7 July 1910, Page 3
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466TYPHOID VACCINE. Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 75, 7 July 1910, Page 3
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