RESISTANCE OF COTTON RATS TO THE VIRUS OF POLIOMYELITIS

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Abstract
The clinical studies by Huffman,1 McCormick2 and Helms3 have indicated that vitamin B deficiency, particularly when accompanied by physical overexertion, may increase the susceptibility of a host to the virus of poliomyelitis. Favorable results in cases of acute anterior poliomyelitis have been said to follow vitamin B therapy.4 In direct refutation are the clearcut results of the studies by Foster, Jones, Henle and Dorfman.5 These investigators found that the death rate of mice inoculated with the virus of poliomyelitis was much greater for those animals which were fed a diet high in thiamine. Even more striking was the finding that the incidence of paralysis in mice which were fed a diet high in thiamine was several times greater than in mice which were fed a diet deficient in thiamine. These observations have been confirmed by Rasmussen, Waisman, Elvehjem and Clark6 and by Toomey, Frohring