Show Cats and Diphtheria I That cats arc capable of contracting and propagating diphtheria has been known for a long time In fact newspaper news-paper Items warning children not to Indulge in familiarities with ailing Pets are not infrequent The Importance of the subject has iccently been emphasized empha-sized however by a small epidemic at Brighton England which seems to havo been traced pretty directly to these animals Wo quote nn account from the British Medical Journal London Lon-don June 29th The cat Is acquiring a bad reputation In BrIghton lr Newsiiolme In his recently re-cently Issued quarterly report devotes a separate section to a description of an outbreak of sucplclous Illness among cats In a particular district of the town and to a warning against keeping cats which are suffering from certain enumerated symptoms Dr Newsholmes attention was called to cats by tile fact that In the neighborhood between Kim Grove and Southover street a part of Brighton Inhabited In-habited almost solely by tho laboring classes there had been notified a group of cases of diphtheria In the course of a single fortnight which pointed distinctly to tho operulon of some local cause The patients comprised both children and adults They did not attend any particular particu-lar school there was no community of milk supply personal Infection from case to case could not be traced and no sanitary sani-tary defects were found In tho affected houses But In each Instance there was a history that the household cat had been III and In several families the child who was specially fond of tho cut was the solo victim of diphtheria TIle Illness of the aflccted cats had not been carefully observed but It Included one or more of the following symptoms A bud cough dltllculty In swallowing discharge from the nose and marked emaciation In some of the houses the cat had simply been observed to be wasting and In several sev-eral Instances the head of tIle household volunteered the surmlin that the cat had been poisoned In ono house In tile center cen-ter of tho affected neighborhood lime live cats weru lound and the neighbors stated that In thc previous week a dead cat lay in tlio yard attached to this house with discharge oozing from its nostrils In another house a mild case of diphtheria was attributed to the smell arising from a cat which had died In a garden ndlolnlng the house Four ot the emaciated cats referred to abovo were secured se-cured and necropsy Including a bacteriological bacteri-ological examination was made but with entirely negative results The Illness of the cats In Question dated from at least a month before the opportunity for examining ex-amining them arose so that tho negative result Is not surprising It will bo remembered re-membered that Dr Klein In his Investigation Investi-gation Into cat diphtheria foiud that the diphtheria Infection produced In the cat an acute lunir Inflammation the kidneys becoming degenerated In tho manner known In man as the luriro whIte Icld nov The condition of the household cat Is worth Inquiring into In all such local outbreaks as the ono brlelly described by Dr Newsholme and It may bo well to remember that If the cat can bo secured for anatomical examination oven In the aouto staio of the disease there will probably bo no exudation In tho throat but onlv marked nemnonta and possibly also renal Inflammation The public warning given In Brighton as to cats has had the desired effect tho smau outbreak havlnir como to an abrupt termination with tho destruction of suspected cuts and of manv others whoso career hus been shortened In consequence of the publicity given to tho facts of tho case |