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13
thus:-There were ten houses in South Brixton and
Stockwell each giving shelter to a single case of Typhoid
fever, no two of them, with the exception of the Lambert
Road residences, being situated in the same street. The
question of all others that demanded answer was—How
and by what means had infection crept into these houses ?
The means taken to investigate the cause of an outbreak
are largely influenced by a knowledge of the nature and
general behaviour of the infecting agent. To sum up in a
few words investigations made by competent observers on
this subject, I may say: that the infecting agent in Typhoid
is an organism belonging to a generic type common among
the microbes of disease which has received the name of
Bacillus: that the Bacillus of Typhoid is capable of
prolonged and independent existence at ordinary temperatures
outside the body: that it dies when exposed to an
artificial temperature of 180 degrees Fahrenheit: that this
organism lives and thrives in sewage and sewage-polluted
waters: that, moreover, it does not usually infect through
the medium of the air, nor is it often conveyed directly
from one person to another, but it invades the human
subject with the food he eats and the water and other fluids
he drinks, these becoming infected through contamination
from contact either direct or indirect with sewage or sewagepolluted
water.
The result of a consideration of the foregoing biological
facts leads us to certain practical conclusions:—
I. That any causal connection existing between the
cases is not to be looked for in evidence of
infection passing from one to another or any
personal contact with infected persons.
II. That on the other hand, infection is conveyed by
food or other articles of consumption.