Life of Elie Metchnikoff, 1845-1916Metchnikoff, Olga
Science
Life of Elie Metchnikoff, 1845-1916
Metchnikoff, Olga
Metchnikoff, Elie, 1845-1916
With the collaboration of Dr. Besredka, he undertook a series of
experiments on anthropoid apes and on macaques. The former alone took
typical typhoid fever, similar to that of man. It could be given them
by pure cultures of Eberth's bacillus, which definitely confirmed the
specificity of that microbe.
Antityphoid vaccination by means of killed bacilli not being at that
time either safe or durable, Metchnikoff advised measures of simple
preventive hygiene: the use of cooked food, great personal cleanliness,
cleanliness of streets and dwellings, and the destruction of insects,
especially flies, which often infect food. In order to popularise these
notions, he wrote a series of articles in newspapers. Later, several
scientists found efficacious means of vaccination against typhoid fever.
In 1912 Metchnikoff, in collaboration with Dr. Besredka (the author of
the antityphoid vaccination method by means of sensitised bacilli),
demonstrated on anthropoid apes that antityphoid vaccination by living
sensitised microbes is certain, and that it presents no danger of
diffusing the disease, for these microbes, harmless to the vaccinated
individual, cannot prove a source of danger for his entourage, since
they are phagocyted at the very place where they are inoculated.
Metchnikoff always considered that it was very useful to keep the
public at large informed of the results acquired by Science, because
"it is only by becoming a part of daily life that measures of hygiene
and prophylaxis will have efficacious results." He therefore lost no
opportunity of spreading scientific principles and facts. In 1908 he
had given in Berlin a lecture on "The Curative Forces of the Organism."
In a Russian review, the _Messenger of Europe_, he developed the
same subject and included an epitome of his lecture in Stockholm
on immunity. In that article he expounded the phagocyte theory of
immunity. Among concrete examples of its application, he quoted the
indications concerning the evolution of an infectious disease provided
by the quantity of leucocytes in the blood, and the process employed
by certain surgeons to diminish the danger of infection during an
operation: just as, in case of an enemy menace, the Government mobilise
an army, certain surgeons employ divers means to attract an army of
phagocytes and to stimulate their activity in case any microbes should
penetrate into the wound.
In 1909 he gave another lecture at Stuttgart, "A Conception of
Nature and of Medical Science," in which he summed up his two works
_Études sur la nature humaine_ and _Essais optimistes_. The title
of this lecture was intended to emphasise his view of human nature,
according to which "Man, as he appeared on the earth, is an animal and
pathological being belonging to the realm of medicine." But he ended
his paper by the same optimistic thought which illumines the whole
philosophy of his later years. "With the help of Science, Man can
correct the imperfections of his nature."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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