Zymotic diseases : their correlation and causation / By A. Wolff.

  • Wolff, Abraham, 1819-1892.
Date:
1872
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Zymotic diseases : their correlation and causation / By A. Wolff. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    Enteric Fever. The etiology of Enteric Fever has been so care- fully studied and so clearly shown to be caused by decaying organic matter, that no further argument is necessary. The investigations of Pringle, Jenner, Murchison, and of many Continental observers, have fixed the etiology of this disease as one of the least questioned facts of medical science. The histories of the various local outbreaks detailed by Dr. Murchison in his treatise on Continued Fevers would be sufficient to prove the causation, and in some of them the disintegrating matter can be clearly traced to the alimentary canal through the medium of drinking waters. The outbreak that occurred in 1859 at Bedford was caused by fsecal matter from cesspools soaking into the wells: the water was found to contain a large quantity of decaying animal matter. In 1847 a local outbreak of enteric fever occurred in Richmond Terrace, Clifton. The inmates of thirteen houses out of the thirty-four constituting the terrace were affected. The inhabitants of those houses drew their water supply from a well that betrayed by its taste and smell contamination from decaying animal matter.