The Distribution of Bacillus botulinus in Scottish Soils

Extract

In January 1923, after the publication of The Epidemiology of Botulism by Dr K. F. Meyer and his colleagues in America, and after the publication of the official report to the Scottish Board of Health on the Loch Maree tragedy, it seemed obvious that an accurate knowledge of the distribution of the Bacillus botulinus in Scotland was very desirable. Dr Meyer had shown that this was an organism which lived in the soil, and he had already published the results of the bacteriological examination of a great number of soils in America and other countries. None of them, however, came from Scotland. I therefore suggested to the Scottish Board of Health that they should ask the Medical Research Council to undertake such an examination, and offered my own services for the purpose of collecting soils from all the Scottish counties. The Board at once agreed, and the Medical Research Council on having the request put to them also at once agreed and appointed Professor Basil Buxton, F.R.C.V.S., to undertake the bacteriological investigation. Prof. Buxton and myself arranged exactly the kind of samples which should be taken, and the method of taking them, and he supplied me from time to time with a number of sterilised containers into which samples of soil were put and forwarded to him for examination.