Volume 2

Fragments of science : a series of detached essays, addresses, and reviews / by John Tyndall.

  • John Tyndall
Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Fragments of science : a series of detached essays, addresses, and reviews / by John Tyndall. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    501/508 (page 489)
    vaccine into the boy's circulation, he might be able to overtake, so to speak, and perhaps neutralise, the viru- lent contagium. The two contagia would, he thought, struggle for the mastery, and in the struggle it was possible that the benign contagium might be trium- phant. He inoculated the boy, with the result that Meister is alive and well at the present hour. He soon afterwards inoculated a brave fellow named Jupille, who, to save a group of children from the attack of a mad dog, exposed himself to severe laceration. Jupille, also, is at the present moment alive and well. A course of such experiments led to the founding in Paris of an institution for the treatment of rabies, which is named after Pasteur. Thither patients are sent from various parts of the world—from wealthy England among other places. It is impossible for the impartial mind not to discern the success of Pasteur. It may be summed up in a few words. Statistics had proved that while the death from rabic wounds in the legs and arms were about 15 or 16 per cent., the deaths from wounds in the face and head were 60, 70, and even 80 per cent. Treated by the method of Pasteur, the deaths in the former case have been reduced from 16 per cent, to 1 per cent., while in the latter case the deaths have been reduced from 70 per cent, to 3 per cent. The figures obtained in 1887, which were published the year follow- ing at the request of the Prefect of the Seine, are these: Of 306 persons bitten by mad dogs, and vaccinated afterwards at the Pasteur Institute, three died; while of forty-four persons similarly bitten, but not inoculated seven died of hydrophobia. If the numbers not inocu- lated had been equal to those inoculated, the deaths, instead of being seven, would have been seven times seven, or forty-nine. I think I may safely leave the conclusions to be drawn from these memorable experi-