Abstract
AT the meeting of the Paris Academy of Sciences on November 2, M. Pasteur submitted a further communication on the results hitherto obtained from his method of treating hydrophobia by inoculation, which has now been in operation for a twelvemonth. The paper is divided into three parts, the first giving the statistical details brought down to the present date, the second describing certain modifications in his method as originally applied, the third giving the results of fresh experiments on animals. Up to October 31 as many as 2496 persons were inoculated at his Paris establishment, and at first the treatment was uniform for all alike, whatever their age, sex, or other varying conditions. Of the total number 1726 were from France and Algeria, 191 from Russia, 165 from Italy, 107 from Spain, 80 from England, 57 from Belgium, 52 from Austria, 22 from Roumania, 18 from the United States, 14 from Holland, the rest from various other parts of Europe, besides 3 from Brazil and 2 from British India. Of 1700 French patients, apart from 2 who arrived too late, 10 only succumbed, whereas of the small minority not treated at the laboratory as many as 17 died in the same period in the rest of France, while for the last five years the average yearly mortality from hydrophobia was 11 in the Paris hospitals alone. Last year it rose to 21, but since November 1885, when the new system was introduced, 2 only died, and these had not been inoculated, besides a third who had been imperfectly treated. Most of those who perished were children bitten in the face and subjected to the simple treatment, which experience now shows to be insufficient in such cases.
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M. Pasteur's Treatment of Rabies . Nature 35, 30–31 (1886). https://doi.org/10.1038/035030a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/035030a0