Whooping cough : its pathology and treatment a prize essay, to which the Medical Society of London awarded the Fothergillian Gold Medal for 1881 / by Thomas M. Dolan.

  • Dolan, Thomas M. (Thomas Michael), 1844-1907.
Date:
1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Whooping cough : its pathology and treatment a prize essay, to which the Medical Society of London awarded the Fothergillian Gold Medal for 1881 / by Thomas M. Dolan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    for all be thrown upon the manner in which contagious and infectious diseases take root and spread. To this end the action of various ferments upon the organs and tissues of the living body must be studied; the habitat of each special organism concerned in the production of each specific disease must be determined, and the mode by which its germs are spread abroad as sources of further infection. It is only by such rigidly accurate inquiries that we can obtain final and complete mastery over these destroyers. Hence, while abhor- ring cruelty of all kinds, while shrinking sympathetically from all animal suffering—sufferings which my own pursuits never call upon me to inflict—an unbiassed survey of the field of research now opening out before the physiologist causes me to conclude, that no greater calamity could befall the human race than the stoppage of experimental inquiry in this direction.' There is a sentimental wave passing over the country, which, unless checked, may put an end to animal experi- mentation, and which may thus impede the progress of science. It finds its advocates in ladies who are dressed in the death-work of the silkworm, in the furs and feathers of animals and birds, and who use other articles made from the skeletons of some animal, bird, or fish. They forget not only how many thousand animals are sacrificed, and how many human lives are lost, in pearl-diving, seal, whale, beaver, or lynx hunting, to gratify their vanity, or the caprice of fashion, yet they shudder at an experiment upon an animal., even though it may be beneficial to the human race. The inflic- tion of unnecessary pain is condemned by all physicians, whilst the infliction of pain in experiment is upheld as justi- fiable, with the object we have in view. § 13, On the Value of a Constant Lesion found in Per- tussis : viz., Ulceration of the Frcenum Linguce. This is a lesion almost constantly to be found in pertussis, though there are different opinions as to its value, frequency, and relation to the disease. Some consider the lesion as constant, initial, and anterior to the kink or cough, related to the different phases of the malady. Most observers, however,