The present epidemic is the result of a disease of extreme
communicability. So far as information available to the committee shows,
the disease is limited to human beings.
The micro-organism of virus primarily responsible for this disease has
not yet been identified. There is, however, no reason whatsoever for
doubting that such an agency is responsible for it. Mental conditions
may cause one to believe he has influenza when he has not, and may make
the patient who has the disease suffer more severely than he otherwise
would. No mental state alone, however, will cause the disease in one who
is not infected by the organism or virus that underlies the malady.
While the prevailing disease is generally known as influenza, and while
it will be so referred to in this statement, it has not yet been
satisfactorily established that it is the identical disease heretofore
known by that name, nor has it been definitely established that all
preceding outbreaks of disease styled at the time “influenza” have been
outbreaks of one and the same malady.
There is no known laboratory method by which an attack of influenza can
be differentiated from an ordinary cold or bronchitis or other
inflammation of the mucous membranes of the nose, pharynx, or throat.
There is no known laboratory method by which it can be determined when a
person who has suffered from influenza ceases to be capable of
transmitting the disease to others.
Laboratories are necessary agencies for the supervision and ultimate
control of the disease. The research laboratory is necessary for the
discovery of the causative micro-organism or virus, and for the
discovery of some practicable method for the propagation of a specific
vaccine and a curative serum. Clinical laboratories are necessary for
the supervision and control of such vaccines and sera as may be used
from time to time for the prevention of the disease and for therapeutic
purposes, and for the information such laboratories can give to health
officers and physicians as to such variations in the types of infective
micro-organisms, as occur during the progress of an epidemic.
Deaths resulting from influenza are commonly due to pneumonias resulting
from an invasion of the lungs by one or more forms of streptococci, or
by one or more forms of pneumococci, or by the so-called influenza
bacillus, or bacillus of Pfeiffer. This invasion is apparently secondary
to the initial attack.
Evidence seems conclusive that the infective micro-organism or virus of
influenza is given off from the nose and mouth of infected persons. It
seems equally conclusive that it is taken in through the mouth or nose
of the person who contracts the disease, and in no other way, except as
a bare possibility through the eyes, by way of the conjunctivæ or tear
ducts.