Claims have been made for infections by a variety of other germs which it would be difficult or unreasonable to deny. In given conditions of the horse’s lung it may succumb to the attacks of pathogenic microörganisms which at other times or under other conditions would be practically harmless. Thus the round ended bacillus of Friedländer is claimed by Jacquot and others to cause one form of pneumonia in the horse as it does in man (Vol. 1 p. 216). Again Galtier and Violet have claimed a form of pneumonia transmitted through musty or spoilt fodders and attacking the bowels as well as the lungs (pneumo-enteritis). Two micro-organisms are accused, a diplococcus and streptococcus, which is strongly suggestive of the now familiar germ of brustseuche.
EQUINE INFLUENZA. ADYNAMIC CATARRHAL FEVER OF SOLIPEDS.
Synonyms. Definition. Historic notes. Equine influenza of 1872–3; its indication of infection. Other evidence: through stables, cars, manure, clothes, coition, inoculation. Bacteriology: streptococci; diplococci; cocco-bacillus, latter pathogenic to rodents, dog, cat, sheep, pig, ox, ass, pigeon, chicken. Inoculations on horse. Present in early stages only. Uncertainty. Accessory causes: chill, electric tension, high barometer, impure air, overwork, poor feeding, season, youth, primary susceptibility, acquired immunity. Incubation 1 to 3 days. Symptoms: Forms: sudden attack, anorexia, profound prostration, weakness, hyperthermia, epiphora, brownish red conjunctiva, pulse, heart beats, catarrhal symptoms, thoracic, pulmonary, pleuritic, cardiac, digestive, urinary, diarrhœal, ophthalmic, nervous, rheumatoid; complications, abortion, laminitis, strangles, contagious pneumonia, cerebro-spinal meningitis, etc. Lesions: inflammation of mucosæ of nose and air passages with blood unaffected; in severe attacks, with heart clots, or later with blood black, diffluent, red globules crenated or dissolved, without viscidity or rouleaux, reddish serum, and hæmatoidin in masses, acid reaction, petechiæ; congestion of mouth, stomach, small intestines or large,—ulcers, tumid follicles, peritoneal effusion, enlarged congested mesenteric glands; liver as if parboiled, with petechiæ and necrosis; spleen large and gorged; kidneys infiltrated, mottled, petechiated, swollen; may be meningeal or ophthalmic congestion; pulmonary lesions, pleural effusions, adhesions, infiltrations, consolidations, infarctions, sequestra. Diagnosis: sudden attack, great numbers attacked, marked prostration, conjunctivitis, great hyperthermia, digestive disorder, evidence of infection. Table comparing croupous and contagious pneumonia and influenza. Prognosis. Mortality low,—high in some epizoötics, in horses kept at work, under bad hygiene. Treatment: good diet and hygiene, rest, shelter, stimulating diuretics and diaphoretics, venesection, antipyretics, alkaline eliminants, inhalants—water medicated, derivatives, collyria, guarded laxatives, antiseptics, cardiac stimulants, nerve sedatives, tonics, transfusion of blood, normal salt solution,—technique. Prevention: quarantine difficult, yet possible; examples, applicability to countries, to districts, lines of restriction.
Synonyms. Epizoötic Catarrh; Catarrhal Fever; Nervous Fever; Epizoötic; Rheumatic Catarrh; Cocotte; Gastro-enteric Epizoötic; Gastro-entero-nephro-hepatitis; Gastro-Conjunctivitis; Gastro-Hepato-meningitis; Entero-pneumo-carditis; Pink eye; Epizoötic Cellulitis; Typhose; Typhoid Fever; Blitz Catarrh; LaGrippe; Septicæmia Hæmorrhagica etc.
Definition. An infectious fever of solipeds, of a specially low or adynamic type, and with a tendency to localization on the respiratory or gastro-intestinal mucosa, on the eyes, lungs, pleura, heart, liver, kidneys, subcutaneous connective tissue, joints, fascia, or nervous system.
This disease was long confounded with the influenza of man and while compelled for the identification of the affection, to retain this name in combination with the qualification equine, yet we would prefer to discard it entirely as conveying the idea that the illness is caused by Pfeiffer’s bacillus, which it is not. The term typhoid fever which is in common use in France, has been selected to convey the impression of its two prominent features of hyperthermia and stupor. But it is open to the same objection for it has been long applied to a specific disease in man having its own bacillus which is not present in the equine influenza. Septicæmia Hæmorrhagica which has been adopted more lately, however correct it may be as indicating the tendency of the local lesions has a generic meaning rather than a specific one, and requires much more qualification to correctly designate the disease. The term adynamic catarrhal fever of solipeds has this recommendation, that it expresses the prostration and debility which is such a marked feature of the disease, its great tendency to become localized on mucous surfaces, and the genus of animals that prove its victims. A better designation is still desirable and may perhaps be reached, when the pathogenic microbe shall be demonstrated beyond question.
Historic Notes. Among catarrhal fevers and epizoötics of early times it is impossible to distinguish this from widespread nasal and bronchial catarrhs, and from contagious pneumonia (brustseuche), yet when the epizoötic attained a sudden and wide extension without any direct climatic cause, the presumption is in favor of the disease now before us. Hints are obtained from Titus Livius of a Sicilian equine epizoötic of this kind 412 B. C. This is corroborated by an account by Hippocrates of a similar outbreak in Greece. Later, Virgil (Georgics), Columella, Absyrtus and Vegetius give similar hints. In 1299 in Seville horses suffered with drooping head, watery eyes, beating flanks and anorexia and 1000 died (Laurentius Rusius). The horses of the French Army in Germany suffered severely in 1648 (Solleysel), horses in England in 1688 (Short, Rutty), again in 1693 (Webster, Short, Foster) and again in 1699 (Webster). In 1712 horses suffered extensively in Europe (Lancisi, Kanold) and in 1727–8 in England and Ireland (Rutty), in 1732–3 (Arbuthnot, Gibson) and again in 1736–7 (Short). Other such equine epizoötics are recorded for Europe in 1729 (Löw), for Ireland in 1746 and 1750–1 (Rutty, Osmer), for Europe and the British Isles in 1760 (Bieset, Rutty, Webster), and again in 1762 (Rutty, Webster) and 1767 (Forster), also in America (Webster), in Europe in 1776 (Fothergill etc.), in Europe and Asia in 1780–2 (Gluge), in England in 1798 (Wilkinson, White), in Europe and England in 1814–15 (Heusinger, Wilkinson, Youatt), in England in 1819, 1823 (Field) and 1827 (Brown), in Europe in 1833 (Prinz, Wilkinson, Hayes, Spooner), 1834 (Hensinger), 1835–6 (Prinz, Friedberger), 1840, 1846, 1851, 1852, 1862, 1870, 1873, 1881, 1883, 1890, 1891, 1892 (Friedberger).
In the United States as in Europe the affection has in the main smoldered in the large cities in ordinary years, to break out without obvious cause, in given years into an advancing epizoötic which sweeps the whole continent. Such were the great outbreaks in Europe in 1881 to 1883, and in America in 1872–3, and 1900 to 1901. The great recrudescence of the disease in North America in 1872–3 was so remarkable in its progress and limitations that it seems desirable to recal its more prominent historic features. The unquestionable demonstration of the microbe of the affection may make such a record superfluous, but until then, and so long as books are published which attribute the disease to the environment, or to the soil, it is not altogether unnecessary.
PROGRESS OF EQUINE INFLUENZA OF 1872–3.
Last week of September, 1872. Toronto, Ontario; (30th) and neighborhood.