Post - Vaccinal Encephalitis

AN important session of the Health Organisation of the League of Nations was held at Geneva from August 22nd to 25th. The reportl of the proceedings has now reached us. Prof. Ricardo Jorge, DirectorGeneral of Public Health Services, Lisbon, presided, and those present were :Members of the Health Committee : Sir George Buchanan, Senior Medical Officer, Ministry of Health, London ; Dr. H. Carriere, Director of the Federal Health Service, Berne ; Dr. N M. Josephus Jitta, President of the Health Council of the Netherlands, The Hague. Experts : Prof. H. Aldershoff, Director of the State Serological Institute, Utrecht ; Dr. F. R. Blaxall, Government Lymph Establishment, London ; Prof. M. Camus, Director of the Superior Institute of Vaccine, Academy of Medicine, Paris ; Prof. Dr. H. A. Gins, Robert Koch Institute, Berlin ; Dr. H. Mervyn Gordon, St. Bartholomew’s Hospital and College and Medical Research Council, London ; Prof. A. Groth, Landesimpfanstalt, Munich ; Prof. G. Sobernheim, Director of the Health Institute of the University, Berne. The questions considered by the Commission were post-vaccinal encephalitis, and the preparation and preservation of vaccine lymph. The third subject on the agenda was the relationship between the different types of small-pox virus and those of certain human and animal pathogenic viruses, but it was decided to postpone discussion until the problem had been further examined. A preliminary discussion on post-vcrccinal encephalitis by a subcommission led to the framing of a report which was adopted by the Commission and is summarised below. Terminology.—The term " post-vaccinal encephalitis " is used in the report for convenience, without necessarily implying that " post-vaccinal " is considered the equivalent of " propter-vaccinal." Some of the thousands, even millions, of persons who are successfully vaccinated in any given year must fall ill during this period in the ordinary chances of life, and they are no more immune from diseases specially affecting brain and nerves than any other persons. During recent years many countries have experienced