Vaccination of calves against tuberculosis with Calmette-Guérin culture, BCG

Abstract

does not appear. First page follows. Introduction When in June, 1924, Calmette and Guérin(20) first published their offer to furnish BCG cultures for experimental trial, the writers took under consideration plans for testing this method of vaccinating animals against tuberculosis. The matter rested until 1926, however, when Mr. H. D. Williamson of Napa, having read press notices of the French experiments, became interested in the possibility of controlling tuberculosis by means of this material in his dairy herd of about two hundred cows on Grisly Island in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Mr. Williamson urged that cultures be secured at once and furnished funds to pay for cablegrams and airmail postage. Plans were then developed for conducting formal investigations under controlled conditions at the California Agricultural Experiment Station, as well as for starting the work with the culture in the Williamson herd. The following paper includes a summary of the experiments with the culture BCG by Calmette and Guérin and others, a report of the investigations with the culture to date at the California station, and an account of the attempt to control tuberculosis by means of culture BCG in a commercial dairy herd, together with summaries and conclusions drawn from the work in California.