Abstract
THE sixty-third annual meeting of the British Medical Association, held in London last week, was the largest in the history of the Association, and one of the greatest assemblies of medical men ever known. Twenty-two years ago the Association held its annual meeting in London, but whereas at that time the membership was only 1500, the number now exceeds 16,000. A large number of foreign medical men were present at the meeting, among them being Prof. Stokvis, Dr. W. W. Keen, Dr. Apostoli, Prof. Mosso, Dr. Fraenckel, Dr. Farkas, Prof. Pozzi, Dr. Ottolinghi, Prof. Lazarewitch, Prof, von Ranke, Prof. Baginsky, Dr. Hermann Biggs, Dr. Ball, Dr. Koster, Prof. Gayet, Dr. Meyer, Prof. Panas, Prof. Fuchs, Prof. Bowditch, Dr. L. A. Nékám, Prof. Baumler, Prof. Martin, Dr. Cushine, Prof. Cordés, Prof. Hamburgher, Prof. Marinesco, and Prof. Geikie. Sir T. Russell Reynolds therefore presided over an assembly international in its main aims, and representing an Association as remarkable in its growth as it is high in its standing. It is only possible here to give a few extracts from some of the addresses and refer briefly to a part of the general work of the sections. For these reports we are indebted to the British Medical Journal, the organ of the Association. Sir T. Russell Reynolds took for the object of his address “the most striking fact of modern physiological, pathological, and therapeutical research, viz. the power of living things for both good and evil in the conservation of health and in the prevention or cure of disease.” In the course of his remarks he said:—“The most important fact with regard to recent microbiological research is the gradually-increasing appreciation of the fact that these lower forms of life exert, not necessarily mischievous, but, indeed, benignant influences on the human body, and that although the mode of their operation is not fully explained they take part in healthy processes, assisting normal functions, nay, indeed, it would seem sometimes producing them and warding off the malign effects of other influences to which we are habitually exposed. These bodies, to which we are indebted for this aid, operate partly by their chemic action and partly by what we must call a vital process, and by their cultivation outside the human body and their modification by passing through other organisms, can be made to exert a malign or a beneficial agency on man. It seems even in the range of possibility that at some time not very distant some other than ‘the ancient mariner’ may apply to them the far-reaching words of Coleridge, and exclaim—
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The British Medical Association. Nature 52, 352–355 (1895). https://doi.org/10.1038/052352a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/052352a0