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WVisconsin Dairyymen's Association.
Prof. Hastifigs: Conditions come in which you cannot understand.
tested a herd recently where that same thing happened; the fellow
swore he had not bought a cow, had not fed mixed skim milk. He may
have gotten it through infection from the factory. You cannot always
explain these things.
A Member:    Does the post-mortem always show that a cow has
tuberculosis?
Prof. Hastings: Of course the best men may be fooled. We killed a
cow at a farmer's course two years ago that we asserted at that time
had tuberculosis, and when we examined her in the laboratory we
fcund she did not have it at all. She had lumpy jaw.
A Member: Is any breed of cattle more susceptible to tuberculosis
than another?
Prof. Hastings: I don't think so. It is simply a case of the cattle
being brought into a place where they acquire the infection. Beef men
like to say that dairy cattle are more delicate, and more likely to get
it, but they all get it when they are exposed.
Mr. Glover: We would like to have Prof. Hastings state whether
tuberculin in any way is injurious to animals.
Prof. Hastings: Not in the quantities that are ever used in the
tuberculin test; it surely is not. It surely is not to the healthy animal,
nor to the tuberculous animal either. -If we would give a cow one
hundred times the tuberculin that we do in the test, it is very liable
to make the disease spread more rapidly, if she Is tubercular.
Mr. Glover:  It is not uncommon to hear that tuberculin causes
tuberculosis.
Prcf. Hastings: That is impossible, because the tuberculin does not
contain any living germ of tuberculosis. It is not as likely to con-
tain them as a globule of Rock river water, because we heat it up to
the boiling point three or four hours; an instant is enough to destroy
the tuberculin organism.
Besides the boiling, we put in half a per cent of carbolic acid, and
that is enough to destroy the tuberculin organism.
Dead ones, like dead men, are pretty harmless.
Judge Rosa: Tuberculin, then, is a by-product of bacteria, rather
than the bacteria itself?
Prof. Hastings: Yes.
A Member: Isn't It like any disease, in the air?
Prof. Hastings: No, you have to have infection. You can not have
typhoid fever unless you get the organisms into your body. And it I3
the same thing with tubevculosis.
A Member: It is very susceptible to being killed if exposed to air
and sunlight, is it not?
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