Carcinoma is a parasitic disease : being the Bradshaw lecture delivered before the Royal College of Surgeons of England / by Henry T. Butlin.

  • Butlin, Henry Trentham, Sir, 1845-1912.
Date:
1905
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Licence: In copyright

Credit: Carcinoma is a parasitic disease : being the Bradshaw lecture delivered before the Royal College of Surgeons of England / by Henry T. Butlin. 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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    The question of the transmissibility of the parasite from one host to another host is naturally inseparably involved in the question of the infective nature of carcinoma. In dealing with this part of the question, I must ask leave to substitute the term “communicable” for the terms “Infective” and “ contagious.” Mere contact with animals suffering from the disease may be quite insufficient to communicate carcinoma; and the mere breathing of the same air may be equally inefficient to communicate carcinoma. But that carcinoma is a communicable disease there can remain no possible doubt. Whether Morau, as Fabre-Domergue asserts,7 was the first person to successfully inoculate mice with cancer some fifteen years ago, or whether priority rests elsewhere, there is not the least doubt now that carcinoma of mice is successfully inoculated In mice by many pathologists in many countries. The experiment has been repeated with such a large per- centage of success that no one any longer doubts it. If, therefore, the carcinoma of the mouse is identical in nature with carcinoma in the vertebrate animals generally, carcinoma is a communicable disease; and all failures to communicate it by inoculation in other animals than the mouse only prove that it Is difficult to inoculate. The difficulty in the case of mice has been overcome, and it has been overcome in spite of the fact that large numbers of healthy mice kept In cages with carcinomatous mice have not contracted the disease. This circumstance has been employed to prove that the disease is not “infective” or “communicable.” It only proves that it is exceedingly difficult for healthy animals to contract it from animals suffering from carcinoma. And it is a matter of congratulation to our unhappy race that a com- municable disease, such as carcinoma, is communicated spontaneously so very rarely that we may regard it as “ not catching” from a popular point of view. Hitherto, I believe that all experiments which have been made with the object of cultivating the carcinoma cell outside the body of the host have resulted in failure, and this has been regarded as strong evidence against the parasitic theory. Even if it be admitted, it is not a serious obstacle to the acceptance of the theory, for there are other parasitic organ- isms which are believed to be unable to exist outside the body of the host. But I am sure the last word has not been spoken on this part of the subject. Ballance and Shattock,8 who do not seem even to have been successful in keeping the cells alive outside the body of the host, still maintained their unshaken belief in the parasitic nature of the disease; and themselves suggested that “a process of cultivation more nearly allied to the natural ” might be indispensable. In their later experiments on the inoculation and cultiva- tion of psorosperms from the livers of rabbits, they not only failed in every attempt to inoculate the parasite, but only succeeded in keeping it alive in tubes by preparing the tubes with rabbit-blood serum. Even then the authors thought there was no evidence that the psorosperms multiplied. Yet these are organisms of the nature and independence of which no doubt exists. Of course, it may be that the carcinoma cell Is an organism incapable of thriving and multiplying out- side the body of the host. But I am not at all disposed to take this for granted. Dr. Bashford quite confirms the ex- perience of Professor Jensen9 on the vitality of the cells of carcinoma. Jensen made successful inoculations from
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