THE SIGNIFICANCE OF HYPERSENSITIVITY IN INFECTIONS

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Abstract
The author compares bacterial hypersensitivity with the anaphylactic and Arthus types of sensitivity, then discusses the role of hypersensitivity in resistance to infection. By citing numerous instances in which hypersensitivity has been experimentally dissociated from acquired resistance (e.g., passive transfer, transmitting immunity but not hypersensitivity; desensitization, or the spontaneous decline of hypersensitivity, while immunity survives), and cases in which the inflammation evoked in a hypersensitive body by the specific bacteria did not prevent their spread or even hasten it, he contests the widely held opinion that bacterial hypersensitivity is a necessary adjunct of acquired resistance. "Hypersensitivity may be regarded at present as a condition which in some instances is decidedly deleterious, in some instances exists without exerting any appreciable deleterious or beneficial effect, and in some instances may possibly serve as a useful auxiliary to the other forces of immunity." The last possibility has not yet been demonstrated in any kind of infection.