Sinclair, Sir William J.: Semmelweis. His Life and his Doctrine (Manchester, 1909)
V. Life in Buda-Pesth
CARL BRAUN lói ments and contentions, but by the simple expedient of selecting dates he has been guilty of misrepresentation and prevarication. If Carl Braun does not believe in cadaveric infection why did he lay down a rule that students must not examine patients on the same day on which they had handled the cadaver? To deny something and yet to act as if it were true is to perpetuate a falsehood. That the cadaver causes infection and that chloride of lime disinfects Carl Braun himself has proved. Then with regard to the etiology, Carl Braun observed epidemics of puerperal fever break out without any discoverable cause, and he saw them disappear without any discoverable cause; but Carl Braun mentions in his book thirty causes of puerperal fever ! Why does he not follow the lead of Scanzoni ? When he saw women dying of puerperal fever without being able to discover a cause he fell back for the etiology upon accident (Zufall). The facts with regard to the high mortality in the clinics at Vienna when Semmelweis was assistant do not shake his faith in disinfection, they only suggest to him that if the opponents of disinfection have worse results than before the origination of the prophylaxis the opponents do not carry out the process of disinfection so exactly and conscientiously as the originator did. We have next a long discussion concerning the influence of the seasons of the year as an etiological factor, and Carl Braun’s rather exaggerated statements with regard to the occurrence of puerperal fever epidemics not only in lying-in hospitals but over different countries, in cities, and in open country districts, including mountainous regions, while the frightful malady spares no class of society. The reply is that these statements if they were true in no way contradict the theory of conveyed infection. Carl Braun trains from 150 to 200 students every year, and how they are instructed in prophylaxis is shown by the shocking mortality in the First Clinic. Dr. Späth sends out from 260 to 300 trained midwives every year, and how well L
