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28
I regret having again to report that during the year under review 1 had
occasion to investigate several cases where shellfish were implicated.
In March, 1906, the Medical Officer of Health for Wandsworth had reason
to connect winkles purchased at Billingsgate with a case of Enteric Fever in his
district.
Samples of the suspected winkles were submitted to Dr. Klein, who reported
as under:—
April 2nd, 1906.
"I beg herewith to report on the special bacterioscopic analysis of the sample
"of winkles brought here on March 17th. As in your letter accompanying the
"sample, the winkles were ' purchased from a merchant in Billingsgate,' and as a
"case of Enteric Fever is attributed to winkles obtained from the same merchant,
"my analysis was, of course, chiefly directed to discover if any specific pollution
"was present in these winkles.
"After thoroughly washing the outside of the shells, about a dozen were
"selected, dried on the outside, and about ten of the fish were removed with their
"liquor into a sterile dish and finely cut up. The total amount of very turbid
"fluid drained off the minced material was just one cubic centimetre.
"The greater amount of this material was used for cultivation, thus :—
"(a) For general orientation as to pollution ; for determining the presence of
"B. coli communis, streptococci, and spores of enteritidis. (b) For search of
"B. typhosus or of B. Gaertner.
(a) Tested for B. coli communis, 0.l c.c., 0.0l c.c., 0.005 c.c.; for
"streptococcus, 0.1 c.c., 0.01 c.c., 0.005 c.c., for enteritidis spores,
"0.2 c.c., 0.l c.c.
"The result of this part of the search was : B. coli communis was present in
"0.l c.c., but not in 0.01 c.c. Streptococci were absent in all cultures. Spores
"of enteritidis were present in 0.2 c.c., but not in 0.l c.c. Considering that
"0.l c.c. of the fluid corresponds to one whole fish, this analysis does not denote
"any marked pollution.
(b) For B. typhosus. Two large Drigalski plates, each with 0.l c.c.; one
"large Drigalski, with 0'05 c.c.
"The number of blue colonies was extremely scanty, and could be found only
in the plates which had received 0.l c.c.
"These blue colonies were (1) colonies composed of motile bacilli, which liquefied
"gelantine, therefore negative. (2) In each of the two plates there was one blue
"colony, which might from general aspect have been taken as that of the
"B. typhosus or B. Gaertner, and being composed of motile cylindrical bacilli;
"but subjecting them to the agglutination test and to subcultures (in the various
"media used for identifying the above two specific microbes) it became at once
"evident that they are not belonging to the group of B. typhosus or of
"B. Gaertner.
"The conclusion to be drawn from this analysis is (1) the winkles do not
"show either general pollution, (2) they do not contain the specific microbe
"searched for.
"E. KLEIN."