Word: toxoids
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...flesh, Dr. Norman A. Christensen of the Mayo Clinic urged his colleagues at the A.M.A. to embark on a crusade. What he wants is nothing less than an all-out campaign to eradicate tetanus in the U.S. by having every man, woman and child immunized with toxoid and periodic booster shots...
...human body through any penetrating wound, through the unhealed navel of the newborn, and through drug addicts' contaminated dope. There is so little that even the best of medical centers can do once the disease has developed, Dr. Christensen insists prevention is the only reliable cure. Tetanus toxoid is cheap and safe; it rarely causes unwanted reactions. It should first be given in a course of three shots paced a month apart, he says. There should be a booster a year later and every five years thereafter...
...that such a relatively simple and obvious treatment, based on an old but neglected principle, should have to wait until 1962 to be tested." Equally amazing is the fact that although lockjaw is almost entirely preventable by vaccination, only one American in four bothers to get the preventive tetanus toxoid shots. Half the 450 tetanus cases reported in the U.S. each year still die unnecessarily...
...risk is nearly always needless, says Dr. Bardenwerper. Although tetanus (lockjaw) itself can be deadly, it can best be guarded against with a toxoid shot, which is made from killed tetanus bacteria and, unlike the antitoxin, contains no animal protein and virtually never causes serious reactions. The public, complains Dr. Bardenwerper, has had too little prodding from doctors on the importance of vaccination with tetanus toxoid, and still less on the need for booster shots every four or five years. Even if the patient has had no recent shots, there is generally no need for antitoxin: before tetanus can develop...
...disease. In particular, the diphtheria bacillus has fascinated him. This microscopic organism produces one of the most potent poisons known in biology. The toxin is, in fact, so powerful that a few molecules of it suffice to kill a cell. An easily made by product of the toxin, diphtheria toxoid, is harmless and serves as an excellent immunizing agent. With the virtually universal immunization of children in Europe and the United States, diphtheria has been "licked" in the medical sense. But it still provides many challenging biological questions...