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PSYCHOLOGY OF LABORATORY ANIMALS
747
TONSILLECTOMY AND POLIOMYELITIS VACCINE logical studies, although not as extensive as in the case of SiR,-A boy aged 6 years had his tonsils removed three the rat, have been undertaken on other animals in current weeks ago. While the boy was in hospital for tonsillectomy laboratory use-for example, mice, cats, dogs, and monhis father became ill at home with headache, neck stiffness, keys. Department of Psychology, and backache. This illness cleared up after a few days, University College London, R. H. J. WATSON. London, W.C.1. but a fortnight after returning home the boy developed bulbar poliomyelitis. The father’s illness must have been ORAL TREATMENT OF PERNICIOUS non-paralytic poliomyelitis, but tonsillectomy made sure ANÆMIA the son’s attack was bulbar. SiR,—In recent work of ours on the intrinsic factor The relationship between tonsillectomy and bulbar of human gastric juice, after its fractionation by activity poliomyelitis is accepted. Poliomyelitis vaccine almost continuous electrophoresis,l the conclusion was drawn certainly gives some protection against the disease. Is that there are no valid reasons why intrinsic factor should there any justification for carrying out tonsillectomy in be necessarily thought of as a definite substance rather children, or adults, who have not been inoculated against than as a reactive or prosthetic group contained in poliomyelitis ? It should very seldom be difficult to post- materials with intrinsic-factor activity. This reactive pone the operation till two injections of vaccine have been could be present either in various mucoproteins of group given to the uninoculated, or a booster dose to those gastric juice, at various concentrations, or in one mucoalready inoculated. protein only and its degradation products. There is still Fazakerley Hospital, A. B. CHRISTIE. a big step from this new concept to Dr. Heathcote and Liverpool. Dr. Mooney’s suggestion, according to which an active THAT DAMNED WORD HEALTH vitamin-B12-peptide complex, absorbable in the intestine, Dr. Gordon his had in his is produced in the normal stomach by simple proteolysis SiR,—Isuspect tongue cheek when he referred, in his interesting and valuable of vitamin-Bl2-protein compounds, and that the intrinsic paper of Sept. 20, to his colleagues in the Public Health factor, in all probability, does not exist at all.2 The following comments on this work occur to me: and School Health Services. Does he want to change the term " public health " to (1) It would be preferable that the potency of Dr. Heathcote and Dr. Mooney’s vitamin-B12-peptide complex be evaluated " public medicine " ? They do not mean the same thing, the by currently accepted methods, which include: (a) testing do they ? And certainly I do not know that my colleagues the by the method of haematopoietic response on preparation (and his) in the School Health Service wish to change the the part of patients with pernicious anaemia in relapse, at title of their service, as he suggests. It is not a school a vitamin-B12 dose level not exceeding 15 g. per day,3 with disease service; that is a concept long since outmoded, a preliminary period of ten days during which a similar dose because conditions have changed. of vitamin B12 alone is given by mouth as control; (b) testing He is right to point out the necessary antithesis of the preparation by one or more of isotope techniques such as health and disease, and right to point out, by inference, the urinary 4 or fxcal5 excretion tests, measurement of the that doctors are by education and experience the ones hepatic uptake of radioactivity,6 or determination of blood radioactivity 7following administration of a labelled vitaminbest fitted to be responsible for the organisation of services whose primary purpose is the maintenance and B12-peptide complex in which vitamin Bl2 may be tagged with 56CO, 58Co, or 60CO. improvement of health. (2) It would be good to ascertain, by*any one of the justWhether public-health and school-health doctors will mentioned isotope techniques, that the cases used by Dr. ever get a fair deal in their salary-ah ! that’s another do not nutritional Heathcote and Dr.
Mooney
question. E. D. IRVINE Health Department, Exeter.
President, School Health Group, Society of Medical Officers of Health.
PSYCHOLOGY OF LABORATORY ANIMALS was more than surprised to read in your issue 20 Sept. (p. 632), in the course of a report on the current activities of UFAW, the following sentences:
SiR,—I
of
"
A second hope is a reduction in the number of animals needed for a given degree of precision... by detection of specific factors which effect variance. On the last point, UFAW is sponsoring a research directed again by Dr. Chance in Birmingham. (The lastmentioned research, incidentally, inaugurates a long overdue study of the psychology of laboratory animals.) "
Far from being inaugural, any research of this kind must ’ come as the next step in the now considerable volume of work in this field which has been undertaken during the present century. For example, N. L. Munn in his Handbook of Psychological Researches on the Rat, which in 1950, gave a bibliography of over 2000 to studies on the psychology of the labdevoted papers oratory rat alone. Since 1950 there has been much additional work done in many parts of the world. It is probably true to say that in many respects we have greater knowledge of the psychology of the laboratory rat than we have of the psychology of human beings. Psycholo-
was
published
represent
The latter can be clinically and hxmatologically indistinguishable from pernicious anæmia,9 but would, of course, respond readily to the oral administration of any material which contained appreciable amounts of vitamin B12· (3) The proof of the satisfactory maintenance of perniciousanaemia patients on Dr. Heathcote and Dr. Mooney’s preparation would be better supported by:
vitamin-B12 deficiency.
(a) Extension of the maintenance treatment of patients with pernicious anxmia beyond the period of 140-290 days reported by the authors. A remission of 5 to 10 months’ duration after an oral dose of 1500 yg. vitamin B12 during the first 3 weeks of treatment may not be surprising at all. Moreover, it would be of interest to demonstrate the superiority of Dr. Heathcote and Dr. Mooney’s treatment over the conventional oral treatment of pernicious anaemia with commercially available intrinsic-factor preparations. The resistance to orally administered commercial intrinsic factor develops rather late in the course of the conventional oral treatment.10 11 The 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
7. 8. 9. 10. 11.
G. B. J., Stephanson, L., Rich, M., Laughton, R. W. Brit. J. Hœmat. 1957, 3, 401. Heathcote, J. G., Mooney, F. S. Lancet, 1958, i, 982. Glass, G. B. J., Boyd, L. J. Blood, 1953, 8, 867. Schilling, R. F. J. Lab. clin. Med. 1953, 42, 860. Heinle, R. W., Welch, A. D., Scharf, V., Meacham, G. C., Prusoff, W. H. Trans. Ass. Amer. Physcns, 1952, 65, 214. Glass, G. B. J., Boyd, L. J., Gellin, G. A., Stephanson, L. Arch. Biochem. Biophys. 1954, 51, 251; Ann. intern. Med. 1957, 47, 274. Booth, C. C., Mollin, D. L. Brit. J. Hœmat. 1956, 2, 223. Doscherholmen, A., Hagen, P. S. J. clin. Invest. 1956, 35, 699. Talbot, T. R., Tetrault, A. F. Ann. intern. Med 1957, 47, 338. Schwartz, M., Lous, P., Meulengracht, E. Lancet, 1957, i, 751. Killander, A. Acta Soc. med. Uppsala, 1958, 63, 1.
Glass,
TONSILLECTOMY AND POLIOMYELITIS VACCINE logical studies, although not as extensive as in the case of SiR,-A boy aged 6 years had his tonsils removed three the rat, have been undertaken on other animals in current weeks ago. While the boy was in hospital for tonsillectomy laboratory use-for example, mice, cats, dogs, and monhis father became ill at home with headache, neck stiffness, keys. Department of Psychology, and backache. This illness cleared up after a few days, University College London, R. H. J. WATSON. London, W.C.1. but a fortnight after returning home the boy developed bulbar poliomyelitis. The father’s illness must have been ORAL TREATMENT OF PERNICIOUS non-paralytic poliomyelitis, but tonsillectomy made sure ANÆMIA the son’s attack was bulbar. SiR,—In recent work of ours on the intrinsic factor The relationship between tonsillectomy and bulbar of human gastric juice, after its fractionation by activity poliomyelitis is accepted. Poliomyelitis vaccine almost continuous electrophoresis,l the conclusion was drawn certainly gives some protection against the disease. Is that there are no valid reasons why intrinsic factor should there any justification for carrying out tonsillectomy in be necessarily thought of as a definite substance rather children, or adults, who have not been inoculated against than as a reactive or prosthetic group contained in poliomyelitis ? It should very seldom be difficult to post- materials with intrinsic-factor activity. This reactive pone the operation till two injections of vaccine have been could be present either in various mucoproteins of group given to the uninoculated, or a booster dose to those gastric juice, at various concentrations, or in one mucoalready inoculated. protein only and its degradation products. There is still Fazakerley Hospital, A. B. CHRISTIE. a big step from this new concept to Dr. Heathcote and Liverpool. Dr. Mooney’s suggestion, according to which an active THAT DAMNED WORD HEALTH vitamin-B12-peptide complex, absorbable in the intestine, Dr. Gordon his had in his is produced in the normal stomach by simple proteolysis SiR,—Isuspect tongue cheek when he referred, in his interesting and valuable of vitamin-Bl2-protein compounds, and that the intrinsic paper of Sept. 20, to his colleagues in the Public Health factor, in all probability, does not exist at all.2 The following comments on this work occur to me: and School Health Services. Does he want to change the term " public health " to (1) It would be preferable that the potency of Dr. Heathcote and Dr. Mooney’s vitamin-B12-peptide complex be evaluated " public medicine " ? They do not mean the same thing, the by currently accepted methods, which include: (a) testing do they ? And certainly I do not know that my colleagues the by the method of haematopoietic response on preparation (and his) in the School Health Service wish to change the the part of patients with pernicious anaemia in relapse, at title of their service, as he suggests. It is not a school a vitamin-B12 dose level not exceeding 15 g. per day,3 with disease service; that is a concept long since outmoded, a preliminary period of ten days during which a similar dose because conditions have changed. of vitamin B12 alone is given by mouth as control; (b) testing He is right to point out the necessary antithesis of the preparation by one or more of isotope techniques such as health and disease, and right to point out, by inference, the urinary 4 or fxcal5 excretion tests, measurement of the that doctors are by education and experience the ones hepatic uptake of radioactivity,6 or determination of blood radioactivity 7following administration of a labelled vitaminbest fitted to be responsible for the organisation of services whose primary purpose is the maintenance and B12-peptide complex in which vitamin Bl2 may be tagged with 56CO, 58Co, or 60CO. improvement of health. (2) It would be good to ascertain, by*any one of the justWhether public-health and school-health doctors will mentioned isotope techniques, that the cases used by Dr. ever get a fair deal in their salary-ah ! that’s another do not nutritional Heathcote and Dr.
Mooney
question. E. D. IRVINE Health Department, Exeter.
President, School Health Group, Society of Medical Officers of Health.
PSYCHOLOGY OF LABORATORY ANIMALS was more than surprised to read in your issue 20 Sept. (p. 632), in the course of a report on the current activities of UFAW, the following sentences:
SiR,—I
of
"
A second hope is a reduction in the number of animals needed for a given degree of precision... by detection of specific factors which effect variance. On the last point, UFAW is sponsoring a research directed again by Dr. Chance in Birmingham. (The lastmentioned research, incidentally, inaugurates a long overdue study of the psychology of laboratory animals.) "
Far from being inaugural, any research of this kind must ’ come as the next step in the now considerable volume of work in this field which has been undertaken during the present century. For example, N. L. Munn in his Handbook of Psychological Researches on the Rat, which in 1950, gave a bibliography of over 2000 to studies on the psychology of the labdevoted papers oratory rat alone. Since 1950 there has been much additional work done in many parts of the world. It is probably true to say that in many respects we have greater knowledge of the psychology of the laboratory rat than we have of the psychology of human beings. Psycholo-
was
published
represent
The latter can be clinically and hxmatologically indistinguishable from pernicious anæmia,9 but would, of course, respond readily to the oral administration of any material which contained appreciable amounts of vitamin B12· (3) The proof of the satisfactory maintenance of perniciousanaemia patients on Dr. Heathcote and Dr. Mooney’s preparation would be better supported by:
vitamin-B12 deficiency.
(a) Extension of the maintenance treatment of patients with pernicious anxmia beyond the period of 140-290 days reported by the authors. A remission of 5 to 10 months’ duration after an oral dose of 1500 yg. vitamin B12 during the first 3 weeks of treatment may not be surprising at all. Moreover, it would be of interest to demonstrate the superiority of Dr. Heathcote and Dr. Mooney’s treatment over the conventional oral treatment of pernicious anaemia with commercially available intrinsic-factor preparations. The resistance to orally administered commercial intrinsic factor develops rather late in the course of the conventional oral treatment.10 11 The 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
7. 8. 9. 10. 11.
G. B. J., Stephanson, L., Rich, M., Laughton, R. W. Brit. J. Hœmat. 1957, 3, 401. Heathcote, J. G., Mooney, F. S. Lancet, 1958, i, 982. Glass, G. B. J., Boyd, L. J. Blood, 1953, 8, 867. Schilling, R. F. J. Lab. clin. Med. 1953, 42, 860. Heinle, R. W., Welch, A. D., Scharf, V., Meacham, G. C., Prusoff, W. H. Trans. Ass. Amer. Physcns, 1952, 65, 214. Glass, G. B. J., Boyd, L. J., Gellin, G. A., Stephanson, L. Arch. Biochem. Biophys. 1954, 51, 251; Ann. intern. Med. 1957, 47, 274. Booth, C. C., Mollin, D. L. Brit. J. Hœmat. 1956, 2, 223. Doscherholmen, A., Hagen, P. S. J. clin. Invest. 1956, 35, 699. Talbot, T. R., Tetrault, A. F. Ann. intern. Med 1957, 47, 338. Schwartz, M., Lous, P., Meulengracht, E. Lancet, 1957, i, 751. Killander, A. Acta Soc. med. Uppsala, 1958, 63, 1.
Glass,