On the cattle plague Part 14

Skins, hides, hair, horns, and hoofs, must therefore always be treated with precaution. The chances of infection by flesh, fat, cleaned guts, and blood, are perhaps more remote, but cannot be lost sight of.

[Sidenote: 4. Particular danger of droppings, or faeces.]

4. The cattle plague, although affecting every part of the animal, shows its visible effects most extensively in the intestinal ca.n.a.l. It is believed, and apparently upon good grounds, that the intestinal discharges are the princ.i.p.al agents, upon the distribution of which mainly depends the spread of the disorder.

[Sidenote: 5. Enumeration of infected things and places.]

5. It follows from the above, that all articles which have been in contact with a diseased animal, or any of its discharges, particularly its faeces, are capable of carrying the infection for an indefinite time, and must be looked upon as being actually infectious to other healthy animals.

Such are racks of wood or iron; cribs or mangers of wood, iron, or stone; articles used for fastening animals; leather collars and straps, ropes and chains; all harness of any animals used for drawing, and all carts, waggons, and carriages which they have actually been drawing; the stalls or sheds in which animals have been standing; the whole lengths of the gutters and drains through which their urine has been flowing; the entire surface over which their manure has been drawn, and all implements with which the removal has been effected; the entire dung-heap upon which infected manure has been put, and the fluid contents of the manure pit, or of the special receptacle for the urine; yards or sheds in which cattle have been kept to tread down long straw, and the whole of such straw and manure, as also the ground beneath them; paths and roads upon which diseased cattle have walked or been carried; fields and meadows upon which they have been grazing; all carts, carriages, trucks and railway trucks in which diseased cattle have been conveyed, and all the platforms, railings, bridges, and boards upon which they have been moved thereto; as also all apparatus which has been used to pen, tie, lift, haul, lower, and fix them; the clothes, and particularly shoes and boots, and iron-pointed sticks of drivers and their dogs; the apparel of all cattle-herds or attendants, particularly their shoes and boots; the shoes and boots of all persons visiting places where diseased cattle are or have been standing; and, in general, the clothes of all persons visiting infected places, ships, and all parts of the platforms, stages, stairs and bridges, hoists and cranes used for embarking and landing the animals; markets, and all sheds, and pens, and implements used in contact with cattle; slaughter-houses, and all persons and implements in them which have been employed upon sick cattle, as also sundry parts or organs which come from sick animals killed in slaughter-houses; knackers' yards, trucks or carts, horses, men, and implements which have been employed in the disposal of sick or dead animals; wells and ponds from which diseased cattle have been drinking, or into which any portion of their excreta has had any opportunity of flowing, directly or indirectly; all fodder, gra.s.s, hay, straw, clover, &c., and particularly remnants of fodder upon which diseased cattle have been feeding; and, in general, all persons, animals, places, buildings, and movable things which have been in contact with matters proceeding from diseased cattle, or with such diseased cattle themselves. To the above-mentioned places and things any of the processes and agents enumerated and described in the following may have to be applied.

[Sidenote: II. Practice of disinfection.]

II.--PRACTICE OF DISINFECTION.

[Sidenote: A. Disinfection by earth.]

[Sidenote: 1. Burying of animals, &c.]

A. _Disinfection by Earth._ 1. _Burying._--All matters that can be buried, so as to remain covered with a thick layer of ground or earth are innocuous. The ground chosen for such interment should be dry. The quickest, and cheapest, and most certain way of disinfecting an animal dead from the plague is to bury it entire.

[Sidenote: 2. Burying of dung.]

2. The droppings, and all straw and other matters contaminated therewith, may also be buried into ground where they are not likely to be disturbed for a long time. The places from which such droppings have been removed to be cleaned and disinfected as will be described below.

[Sidenote: 3. Infected manure and compost heaps.]

3. Manure heaps and the down-trodden manure of cattle yards, if they have become infected by even a small quant.i.ty of the droppings of a diseased animal, should be carefully shifted to a suitable piece of ground, and there be transformed into compost heaps. A layer of manure one or two feet in thickness should be covered all over with six inches of dry earth, ashes, and mineral rubbish; upon this another layer of manure may be placed, and then again a layer of earth, and so forth, until the whole of the manure is stacked; it should be covered all over with a continuous layer of earth of from six inches to one foot in thickness. If the manure heap or yard manure cannot be shifted, it may be covered on the spot with a layer of dry earth, after which all animals are to be kept away from it.

[Sidenote: 4. Removal of boil infected by soakage.]

4. If the floor of any shed or stable in which diseased cattle has been standing is not constructed with special water-tight and impenetrable material, it must be a.s.sumed to be infected to the depth of at least six inches. This ground should therefore be removed, together with any stones, pavements, or wood work which may have been in contact with it, carted to a piece of dry land and buried. Half-rotten wood is a particularly favourable carrier of infection.

Mortar, bricks, loam, or any other lining of the sides of a pen in which a diseased animal has been standing, should be broken out and buried.

[Sidenote: B. Disinfection by fire.]

[Sidenote: 1. Burning.]

B. _Disinfection by Fire._ 1. _Burning._--All infected articles of a minor value, or made of incombustible materials, can be disinfected by exposing them to a heat which will char organic matter. To this cla.s.s of articles may be reckoned racks of wood or iron; cribs or mangers of wood, iron or stone; leather collars and straps, ropes and chains; dry manure, residues of fodder from which diseased cattle have eaten; and all such small articles of little value which can easily be replaced by new ones. Chains may be exposed to a dull red heat; all other articles may be heated over a fire of coal, brushwood, or straw until well scorched. All new articles of ironware should be bought in a galvanised state, to prevent the formation of rust, the acc.u.mulations of which form convenient seats for infectious matter, and for the same purpose it is desirable that iron articles which have been disinfected by heat as above should afterwards be either galvanised, or, at least, while hot be treated with resin, to cover them with a durable varnish, or should be varnished or painted.

[Sidenote: C. Disinfection by chloride of lime. General remarks.]

C. _Disinfection by Chloride of Lime._--Chloride of lime, or bleaching powder, is the most powerful, the cheapest and most easily managed of all artificial disinfectants. It can be had everywhere, and at any time, and in quant.i.ties sufficient for every purpose. It should as much as possible he applied in solution, of a strength varying somewhat with the particular purpose for which it is to be employed; and after it has been allowed to act upon the surface or matter to be disinfected a reasonable time, should be washed off, together with all products of decomposition. As chloride of lime does not destroy only the infectious matter in a mixture, but destroys all organic matter without distinction, it is not applicable to large quant.i.ties of matter, such as the manure of cattle, dung-heaps, &c., inasmuch as twice or three times the weight of these matters of chloride of lime would be required for their effectual destruction and disinfection. It is further inapplicable to all matters rich in ammonia, particularly putrid urine, as it destroys the ammonia and evolves a large amount of gases, some of which have a repugnant odour, and are perhaps not quite innocuous. But for the disinfection of surfaces of things and places no better or more suitable agent than chloride of lime is at present known to science.

[Sidenote: D. Special directions for disinfection of stables, sheds, &c., trucks, and ships, &c.]

[Sidenote: 1. Special directions.]

[Sidenote: Washing.]

[Sidenote: Scrubbing.]

[Sidenote: All washing water to be disinfected.]

D. _Special Directions for the Disinfection of Stables, Sheds, Vans, Railway Trucks, and Cattle Ships,[V] and of Persons and Things connected with them._--1. After such a place has been cleaned by mechanical means, sc.r.a.ping, &c., as much as possible, and all manure and dirt has been carefully buried, the entire surface which has been contaminated, or is likely to have been contaminated, should be covered with a layer of chloride of lime in powder. The powder should be worked about with a broom until equally distributed. It is intended to disinfect the water to be used in the washing process which is now to commence. Clean water, from a hose in which it flows under pressure, or from a force-pump, garden-engine, or from large watering-pots or water-cans, or poured freely from buckets, should now be applied to the entire surface by one person, while another at the same time scrubs the entire surface; and particularly all crevices, joints, and irregularities. The washing water and chloride of lime are then to be worked down the gutters, into the sinks, cesses, or natural watercourses. No washing water from any infected place or thing should ever be allowed to flow into any cesspool, urine-hold, dung-heap, pond, sewer, or natural watercourse, without having previously been mixed and stirred with a liberal amount of chloride of lime. When the place has thus been scrubbed until the water flows off clean, it is ready for effectual disinfection.

[Sidenote: 2. Actual disinfection.]

[Sidenote: Solution of chloride of lime.]

[Sidenote: How applied.]

[Sidenote: How long to be left on.]

2. For this purpose a solution of chloride of lime in water, in the proportion of one pound of the powder to one gallon of water, is made. For the lair of one animal from six to ten gallons of such fluid should be prepared. This fluid is now distributed over the whole surface to be disinfected, gradually, by squirting from a syringe, or by pumping through a force-pump, garden-engine, or by watering from a watering-pot or can with a finely pierced rose. All woodwork, stones, bricks, cement, mortar, all fixtures of whatever material, should be well wetted with the solution, and immediately be scrubbed with a hard brush. Floor and ceiling are also scrubbed, and the whole is left in this wet state covered with the chloride of lime solution for at least one hour, during which time care is taken that no parts become dry.

[Sidenote: 3. To be washed off after disinfection.]

[Sidenote: Flushing.]

[Sidenote: Precautions as to direction of clean water.]

3. As the chloride of lime and the products of its decomposing action upon infectious matters may be hurtful to cattle, these matters have to be carefully washed off by a second and final flushing. For this too much water and too much scrubbing cannot be employed. Care should be taken to apply the clean water always to the highest parts, so as to cause it to flow thence to the lower parts, and to wash away the waste from the lower parts before applying any fresh water to the upper parts.

[Sidenote: 4. Care not to carry back dirt by brooms, boots, &c.]

4. Care should also be taken to rinse and flush every broom which has worked away sediment and waste from the lower parts into and through the gutters and drains before applying it again to the clean upper parts. Care should also be taken that the working persons should not step from the dirty or partially cleansed places on to the clean ones, as this may suffice to bring infection back to the disinfected place.

[Sidenote: 5. Disinfection of workmen and tools.]

5. Lastly, all persons employed in this work, having swept and flushed the gutters with the same care as the lairs, are collected, together with all engines and tools which they have used, as near as possible to the sink or place of final egress of water from the premises, and there disinfected as will be described.

[Sidenote: Tools.]

The tools, such as hooks, forks, spades, hoes, barrows, &c., are scrubbed with the above solution of chloride of lime, and subsequently water until clean; they are then repeatedly wetted with the solution, and after it has had time to disinfect the entire surfaces of them, they are washed clean and laid up, or hung up to dry.

[Sidenote: Workmen.]

[Sidenote: Disinfection of boots.]

[Sidenote: Disinfection of workpeople's bodies, hands, &c.]

[Sidenote: Changing and disinfecting clothes.]

[Sidenote: Burning of articles of little value.]

The workmen, then, having finished the disinfection and flushing of all objects and surfaces, effect their own disinfection in the following manner:--They wash their boots most carefully with chloride of lime and water, sc.r.a.ping the soles and scrubbing the seams where the soles join the upper leather. They wash their hands and arms, and by means of clean rags or sponges they remove any splashes from their clothes. After this they go indoors, remove all clothes from head to foot, wash their bodies, and particularly their hands, faces, hair and feet, with plenty of soap and water, and put on fresh clothes and linen. The clothes and linen which they have taken off should be treated as infected, set to soak immediately in boiling water and afterwards disinfected, or in water containing two ounces of chloride of lime to the gallon in solution, or containing four ounces of Condy's red permanganate of potash fluid in solution; or the clothes and linen should be put in a copper and boiled and subsequently washed. All articles of little value which are much soiled should be burned on a bright fire.

[Sidenote: E. Disinfection of live stock.]