London's Pulse: Medical Officer of Health reports 1848-1972

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Paddington 1895

Report on vital statistics and sanitary work for the year 1895

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78
cular disease in the udder which do not show any
signs of the affection, at least in the early stages,
and, further, it is by no means proved that tuberculosis
is conveyed by milch cows only when the
udder is affected. Under these circumstances it
seems desirable that more use should be made of the
test by "tuberculin," Koch's preparation, which
was thought would prove a specific remedy for the
disease. This test has been used with great success
in the United States of America. The Philadelphia
Board of Health recently adopted this test as a
condition precedent to registration and licence to
sell milk. In this country the test was applied
during the year to a large provincial herd of milch
cows, and many were found to be tuberculous. The
diseased animals were slaughtered and sold for food.
Were the test introduced, its first result would
be to weed out the diseased animals, and if
applied to fresh stock, the introduction of diseased
animals into the herd or dairy could be prevented.
A Bill was drafted last year by M. Gadaud, the
French Minister of Agriculture, proposing to make
the use of the test compulsory. The following
account of the provisions of the Bill are taken from
the "Standard ":—
Every beast presenting clinical signs of the disease (tuberculosis)
is to be slaughtered by order of the Prefect. Any beast showing
signs suspected to indicate tuberculosis is to be submitted to the
tuberculin test, and if a reaction takes place the Prefect will order the
beast to be slaughtered. All cattle which have cohabited with an
animal known to be tuberculous are to be submitted to the test, and