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1927 44
is doubtful whether this practice is justifiable. Statistically it leads to much
confusion ; indeed, comparisons between Diphtheria notification rates in different
areas and in different parts of the country have for some years been rendered
very unreliable by reason of uncertainty in this respect. Administratively,
the effect may be equally unsatisfactory. The healthy carrier, as a result of
his notification as a victim of Diphtheria is frequently removed to hospital
where he may stay to the exclusion of persons urgently requiring
treatment (a matter of great importance during the stress of an epidemic) and
at unnecessary cost to the public authorities. Further enquiry and consideration
might have shown that no benefit to the community or to the
individual was likely to result from his segregation. A child attending
school, for example, who is found to be a carrier, may merely have acquired
that condition in common with the majority of the other children in his class
at a time when Diphtheria infection has been prevalent in the school for
many months, and himself have no signs of illness ; his bacilli may be nonvirulent,
and consequently he does not in all probability constitute a danger
to others. Non-virulent Diphtheria bacilli are not known to be capable of
changing into virulent organisms."
The outbreak at the Claremont Mission would appear to have been a few
cases of genuine Diphtheria, but the number was swelled and much anxiety
caused by the "bacteriological" cases found by swabbing the whole staff and
the children in attendance. Amongst the general public, if such swabbing were
carried out, there would also be found a considerable number of "carriers," the
majority of them non-virulent.
DIPHTHERIA—PATHOGENICITY TESTS.
1927.
No. Submitted for Negative Result. Positive Result. Non-Virulent. Virulent.
Examination. (Bacilli) (Bacilli)
36 29 7* 2 4
*1 not tested for Pathogenicity