elongs. If this policy is
followed it should be attempted only after careful study of the plan known
as the Bang method of controlling tuberculosis. The live-stock officials of
the State should be frequently consulted and their advice followed;
otherwise failure will surely ensue. The plan necessitates considerable
trouble and is not recommended except under the circumstances mentioned.

BOVINE TUBERCULOSIS AND THE PUBLIC HEALTH.

The increasing amount of evidence pointing to the identity of human and
animal tuberculosis, combined with the extraordinary mortality of human
beings from this disease, often amounting to 10 to 14 per cent, has raised
the question in all civilized countries as to how far animal, and
especially bovine, tuberculosis is to blame for this high mortality. The
medical and veterinary professions have approached this problem with equal
zeal, and much has come to light within recent years which enables us to
come to some conclusion. If this disease is transmitted from animals to
man, how does the transmission take place? As comparatively few people come
in direct contact with tuberculous cattle, it must be either through the
meat, the milk, the butter, the cheese, or through all these products that
the virus enters the human body. The question has thus narrowed itself down
to the food products furnished by cattle.

It has become a very urgent question, especially in the poorer countries of
Europe, whether all flesh from tuberculous animals is unfit for human food.
It is argued there that if it can be shown that in the majority of cases of
tuberculosis the bones and the muscular system are free from infection,
there is no reason why the meat should not be put on sale under certain
restrictions. The question may be resolved into two divisions: (1) How
frequently does the disease invade those parts of the body which are used
as food? (2) When the disease process is manifestly restricted to the
internal organs, do tubercle bacilli circulate in the blood and lymph and
can they be detected in the muscular tissue?

(1) Disease of the bones is not unknown, although very rare. According to
Walley, it appears chiefly in the spongy bones of the head and backbone and
in the long bones of the limbs. Occasionally the ends of the bones, where
they are covered by the synovial membrane of the joints, are dotted with
tubercles. The muscular system itself is very rarely the seat of
tuberculous deposits, although the