A recent investigation of diphtheria carriers in Detroit is reported by
Goldberger, Williams and Hachtel, in Bulletin No. 101, of the Hygienic
Laboratories, of the United States Public Health Service. The problem of
diphtheria carriers has become one of considerable importance and has
been given special prominence of recent years by the studies of von
Scholly, Moss, and Nuttall and Graham Smith. The writers of the report
mentioned above studied 4,093 people in the city of Detroit, and found
that 0.928 per cent harbored bacilli identical morphologically with the
Klebs-Loeffler bacillus. This figure is rather lower than those of some
other investigators, but would indicate, as stated by the writers, that
there were from 5,000 to 6,000 diphtheria carriers in the city of
Detroit.
Of nineteen cultures isolated from nineteen of the carriers, only two
were virulent, which would indicate that only 0.097 per cent of the
people examined carried organisms capable of producing disease. An
interesting further point is that the bacillus Hoffmanii was present in
at least 41.9 per cent of over 2,000 individuals examined, and that the
forty-nine cultures morphologically identified as bacillus Hoffmanii
were avirulent. This would confirm the impression gained, we believe, by
most experienced laboratory workers, that a true Hoffmanii can be
distinguished with considerable certainty from a Klebs-Loeffler bacillus
by morphological examination alone, and that its significance is
probably that of a frequently present saprophyte of the throat and
pharynx. The studies of Goldberger, Williams and Hatchtel also indicate
that in examining for diphtheria carriers, it is best not to confine
oneself either to the nose or throat, but that cultures should be taken
from both places in every case.—_The Journal of Laboratory and Clinical
Medicine._