The infectivity and management of scarlet fever / by W.T. Gordon Pugh.

  • Pugh, William Thomas Gordon, 1872-1945.
Date:
1905
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The infectivity and management of scarlet fever / by W.T. Gordon Pugh. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    direction which rational disinfection should take, and the need for promptness and discrimination in dealing with this matter. Conditions Necessary for Transmission—In con- clusion of this section I shall enumerate the conditions which appear to be necessary for the transmission of scarlet fever and similar diseases from a potentially infectious person. The contagium must be present in a form capable of being carried ; there must be a vehicle for its conveyance ; it must be actually conveyed to a mucous membrane ; the germ must be still virulent when received ; the dose must be suffi- ciently large, and the receiver must be susceptible to infection. In m.easles all these conditions are usually fulfilled in marked degree. There is abundant secretion, distribution of which takes place by sneezing and coughing, by the con- taminated hands of the attendant, and by articles smeared with the infective discharges. Susceptibility is almost uni- versal, and the disease would appear, from an epidemic in the Faroe Islands, to affect all ages alike. In scarlet fever the mucous discharges are common during the acute illness, and not infrequent in the later stages ; dis- tribution occurs as in measles. The average susceptibility is much less, however, and varies according to age, being esti- mated from the records of an outbreak’ among a totally unprotected population at Thorshavn, the capital of the Faroe Islands, at 67 per cent, for persons under twenty, and 13 per cent, for those above that age. In diphtheria the discharges are also frequent during the acute illness, but much rarer in the convalescent stage ; return cases thus occur in^ diphtheria less commonly than in scarlet fever. Transmission takes place as in that disease, but the average susceptibility is less. * Vide Xothnagel’s Encyclopcedia of Practical Medicine.