Abstract
THESE lectures do not pretend to give any very minute anatomical details, or any full account of the life history of the remarkable group of animals of which they treat, and which Dr. Cobbold has so long and so carefully investigated. They were originally delivered to medical students, but are so simply and clearly written that they might advantageously be read by the public. They show the frequency with which parasites occur in man, and the necessity of careful supervision of the animal food exposed in our markets for sale, especially at night and to the poor. Dr. Cobbold remarks that the terms “measly mutton” and “measly beef” are terms which will sound strange to those who know of no other “measled meat” than pork; but he points out that his investigations have incontestably proved and verified the existence of larval tapeworms in the most esteemed kinds of animal food. The tapeworms derived from these three kinds of meat, beef, mutton, and pork, though agreeing in their general characteristics, yet differ in minor points, and especially in the shape of their heads. The head of the beef tapeworm is destitute of hooks, and has four large suckers, besides a supplementary fifth (so called); whilst the head of the pork tapeworm is a trifle smaller, and furnished with a slightly prominent proboscis, armed with a double row of hooks. The mutton tapeworm is also armed, at least the “measle” is provided with hooks. A fully-developed beef tapeworm numbers about eleven hundred joints, and attains its full development in about thirteen weeks or rather less. Dr. Cobbold appears to regard the well-made ethereal extract of the root of male fern as by far the best remedy for tapeworm, though kousso, kamala, turpentine, panna, pumpkin seeds, betel nuts, and the bark of the pomegranate, are occasionally successful in effecting their expulsion, and will sometimes accomplish this when the oil of male fern has failed. In regard to thread worms (Oxyuris vermicularis) Dr. Cobbold states that it is quite a mistake to suppose the lower bowel or rectum forms their special habitat. He recommends santorine, with active saline purgatives, and copious enemata, for their removal. The large, round worm, Ascaris lumbricoidesM, and the Ascaris mystax, are in his experience rare, the latter, indeed, very rare in England, but they are endemic in some regions, as in the Mauritius. The Trichina appears to have been only once recognised and treated in the human subject, namely, by Dr. Dickenson, of Worthington. In this instance Dr. Cobbold calculated that the patient played the host to forty million of the parasites. He observes that when once the Trichina has gained admission to our muscles, all hopes of dislodging it are at an end; but if a person suspects that he has eaten diseased or trichinised meat, he should lose no time in seeking assistance. Immediate advice, followed by a suitable antitrichinalic, might be the means of saving his life, whereas a few days' delay would perhaps prove fatal. Whilst the worms are in the intestinal canal we can get rid of them, but when once the trichinal brood migrates into the flesh no means are known by which their expulsion can be effected. The work terminates with some amusing cases of spurious worms.
Worms;
a Series of Lectures on Practical Helminthology, delivered at the Middlesex Hospital, by T. Spencer Cobbold. (London: Churchill, 1872.)
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P., H. Worms . Nature 6, 24 (1872). https://doi.org/10.1038/006024a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/006024a0