Medicine: Rheumatism Serum

Modestly, Bacteriologist James C. Small of the Philadelphia General Hospital told Director Wilmer Krusen of the Philadelphia Public Health Department that he had isolated a new, minute organism (Streptococcus cardioarthritidis) from the blood of rheumatic patients and had been able to build a serum that cured a few cases of rheumatism. Director Krusen was delighted, for the cause of rheumatism (rheumatic fever) is obscure. Doctors know as little about it as they do about cancer. Rheumatism does not kill so many people as does cancer. Yet it is responsible for one-fourth of all heart disease deaths.

The Philadelphia men are confident they have the remedy for rheumatism. But, proper scientists, they made their announcement cautiously: "We are making only modest claims as to the value of this new serum because it is still in the experimental stage, and too small a number of cures has been effected to evaluate properly its ultimate efficacy. We do not wish to arouse undue hopes in the minds of sufferers from acute rheumatic fever with the announcement of this report, realizing that there will be many disputes in the medical profession, both pro and con, as to the real merits of this discovery. Should confirmation be made that Dr. Small has isolated and identified the specific cause of this disease and has prepared a serum for its cure, we shall then have achieved a success rivaling no less a discovery than that of insulin for the treatment of diabetes."