Interim report on the relations of septic to pathogenic organisms / by E. Klein.

  • Klein, Edward Emanuel, 1844-1925.
Date:
1884
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Interim report on the relations of septic to pathogenic organisms / by E. Klein. 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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    (i such a culture a fresh culture be established, it again proves fatal to mice ; or if in the culture spores appear it retains its virulence ad infinitum, (c) If a culture of bacillus of blood of guinea pig be established and kept at 42°-43° C. for two or three weeks, it loses, in many cases, its fatal action on sheep ; but if the bacilli of such a culture be after- wards allowed to form spores, or if a new culture is made, it proves again virulent to sheep. The same holds good also for those bacilli anthracis which, owing to the admixture of certain antiseptics, lose their virulence, though they do not lose their vitality. Such bacilli are capable of starting cultures, in which the new bacilli, although not so plentiful, ftill possess virulent action. Seemingly M. Pasteur has worked with cultures which did not contain the bacillus anthracis, but which, owing to accidental contamination at the time of starting the new cultures, developed a putrefactive non-pathogenic bacillus, and it hardly needs to be noted that if the bacilli of a culture not containing spores become, all of them, involved in a process of degeneration {see my Report, 1881) their virulence and their vitality have alike passed away. Blood bacilli and bacilli of cultures too that have been subjected for more than a few minutes to a high degree of heat or have been acted on by certain antiseptics are similarly inactive, for they are dead. To sum up—all that may be confidently asserted respect- ing modification of bacillus anthracis by culture is this: bacillus anthracis of a particular cultivation is capable, with- out losing its -satality, of losing its virulence for a particular species of animal, while retaining it, however, for certain other species ; and, further, the bacillus which has thus lost its virulence will regain it in a new cultivation. But surely this cannot be called a change of a pathogenic into a non- pathogenic organism, for is not the same organism pathogenic to other species, and does it not yield again pathogenic offsprings ? Section II. I now pass to consider whether there exist naturally or can be artificially induced, varying degrees of virulence of bacillus anthracis. M. Pasteur bids us recognise varying degrees of virulence in his cultures of anthrax bncillus, and a superficial conside- ration of the subject lends support to an assumption of this sort. Thus the bacillus of the blood of sheep and cattle