477

Bantu, whose fat metabolism is now being studied (thisis the reason for our interest in this subject), when livingon their’ customary diet, composed mainly of maizeproducts and beans, consume about 30 g. of fat daily ;they do not behave as

" worn-out " persons. TheJapanese,"O hardly marked by tiredness or lack of self-confidence, are reported to consume 15-20 g. of fat daily.More remarkable, in the most prosperous regions of Javathe daily fat intake is reported to be less than 10 g. ; ;yet, according to van Veen 11 the inhabitants are in goodnutritional condition.

Finally, in the only long-term fat-metabolism studyon adult man, a subject consumed 2 g. of fat daily forsix months,12 and no pathological changes were observedin his blood, urine, or basal metabolism. Subjectively,the person felt less tired on the experimental diet than onhis normal diet.There is, of course, no desire to minimise the psycho-

logical, as distinct from the physiological, r6le of fat inthe diet; the deprivation of fat to those habituated toa relatively high intake is undoubtedly a grievous hard-ship. But in view of the three types of evidence discussed,it is surely unjustifiable to define the deficiency symptomsof a nutrient whose minimum requirement is not yetestablished. A. R. P. WALKER.

Nutrition Unit, Council for Scientific andIndustrial Research, South African Institute for

Medical Research, Johannesburg.

LIFE AND DEATH IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP

Sm,—I should like to comment on the report ofDr. Wolff-Eisner’s book in your issue of Aug. 7. As aprisoner in the concentration camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau and later in a camp in Friedland near Breslau,I had opportunity to observe the consequences of famine.

I disagree with the statement that raw potatoescaused diarrhoea. On the contrary, in our camp wedeliberately and successfully combated diarrhoea withraw potatoes. The effect was similar to that of anapple diet. Nocturia was not due to

" irritable bladder "as Dr. Wolff-Eisner thinks ; nor could it have been theconsequence of incipient famine oedema, for nocturiaand polyuria started from the first day in prisonersarriving from Slovakia in a good nutritional state. Itwas simply the consequence of food being given in theform of great quantities of soups-4-6 litres daily.Evidently such quantities of fluid could not be whollyexcreted in the day-time, and the evening soup especiallyhad to be excreted during the night as it would haveto be by every healthy subject. In the later stages, ofcourse, the elimination of cedema fluid in the horizontalposition from the lower parts of the body contributedto the nocturia in a smaller degree.

Severe vitamin deficiencies were not observed, becausepotatoes, which are rich in vitamin C, and various othervegetables containing carotene and vitamins B and Cconstituted in most camps the bulk of the food (kohlrabi,white and yellow turnips, and red beet). It is not sur-prising, therefore, that in Dr. Wolff-Eisner’s experiencethe addition of yeast had no remarkable effect.

Doctors coming to our camp from Theresienstadtbelieved, as did Dr. Wolff-Eisner, that deficiency offat was an important cause of famine cedema, foraddition of bacon to the diet caused’the oedema to dis-appear. Perhaps a more plausible explanation is thatthis addition of fat calories saved body and blood proteinfrom destruction and enabled the very small amountof protein in the food to be utilised. In all cases offamine cedema in our camp I found the chief cause tobe lack of calories, although the protein intake (in theform of horse meat) during most of our imprisonmentalmost covered minimum requirements. But, as thecalorie intake was always insufficient, body proteinmust have been destroyed to make up the requiredtotal of calories. The result was a fall in blood proteins,which in turn was the chief cause of famine oedema.

Presov, Czechoslovakia JURAJ ORAVEC.

10. Bourne, G. H. Nature, Lond. 1946, 157, 177.11. van Veen, A. C. Ann. Rev. Biochem. 1942, 11, 391.12. Brown, W. R., Hansen, A. E., Burr, G. O., McQuarrie, I.

J. Nutrit. 1938, 16, 511.

HOMOLOGOUS SERUM HEPATITIS

SiR,-In the summary of his paper of June 19 (p. 941),Dr. Borensztejn claims that homologous serum hepatitisis transmissible to rabbits. This statement was basedon an experiment in which the single rabbit inoculatedintravenously with blood from a fatal case of jaundicedied two months after inoculation and was found to havenecrosis of the liver. The single control rabbit inoculatedwith distilled water remained well. In case it be thoughtthat the problem of homologous serum jaundice has nowbeen solved, I think it should be mentioned that bloodfrom cases of infective hepatitis and homologous serumhepatitis have been inoculated into rabbits on numerousoccasions by various workers in recent years with negativeresults. As an illustration, three experiments were carriedout in 1942 at the Wellcome Institute in London. Inthe first, two rabbits were inoculated intravenously withblood from a patient with infective hepatitis ; in thesecond, two rabbits were injected intravenously withblood from two cases of jaundice in soldiers of the U.S.Army who had received icterogenic yellow-fever vaccine ;and the third pair received blood from two patients withjaundice following inoculation of an icterogenic pool ofconvalescent mumps serum. All these animals remainedperfectly well over a period of a year.

Virus Reference Laboratory,Central Public Health Laboratory,

London, N.W.9.

F. O. MACCALLUM.

SiR,—In view of Dr. Borensztejn’s claim to have trans-mitted homologous serum hepatitis to a rabbit, someessentially negative work carried out in 1945 may beworth putting on record. Starting from the hypothesisthat homologous serum jaundice was not caused by avirus, but was the result of sensitisation by some productof liver damage present in the injected serum, attemptswere made to produce a similar disease in rabbits. Tworabbits were treated with carbon tetrachloride over aperiod of some days so as to produce progressive liverdamage ; when this was at its height serum was obtainedfrom the animals and was inoculated into other rabbits.Blood samples were taken from these rabbits at weeklyintervals and determinations of serum bilirubin werecarried out. In all 16 rabbits were observed over a periodof up to four months. The results were at first encouragingin that 10 animals showed a progressive rise of serumbilirubin up to a maximum of 1-67 % in one instance,while one animal died of acute liver atrophy. As thework progressed, however, it became evident that theeffects noted could not be attributed to the experimentalprocesses but were most likely due to some extraneousfactor such as a dietary insufficiency or the presence ofsome infective agent in the stock of rabbits, and the workwas therefore discontinued.

While shedding no light on the aetiology of homologousserum hepatitis these results show that liver disturbance,progressing occasionally to acute necrosis, may occur inrabbits apparently spontaneously, and that claims tohave transmitted the human disease to rabbits cannotbe seriously entertained unless supported by observationson a much larger series of test and control animals.

D. J. BAUER.

Wellcome Laboratories of Tropical Medicine, London, N.W.I.

MAN INTO WOLF

SiR,-With regard to the annotation under thisheading on July 10, I think it is of interest to quoteCervantes,l who, freely translated, wrote :

" To suppose that these northern people become sheor he wolves is a very great mistake," said Mauricio," although many believe they do."

" How is it, then," said Arnaldo, " that everybody says,and it is taken for certain, that in the fields of England areherds of wolves which are human beings so transformed ?

"

" Such a thing," answered Mauricio, " is impossible inEngland, for in that mild and very fertile country neitherwolves nor any other kind of harmful animals such asserpents, vipers, toads, spiders, or scorpions can grow ; itis well known that if any sort of harmful animal is broughtto England, on arrival there it dies ; and if from that

1. Los Trabajos de Persiles y Segismunda, book 1, chap. 18.