Shorter Notices
The Conquest of Disease, the Story of Penicillin. By George Bankoff, M.D. (MacDonald and Co. 6s.) Tins is a book evidently written for popular consumption, dealing mainly with the discovery of penicillin as a therapeutic agent and the conditions in which it has so far proved valuable, often to an astonishing degree. But it also touches briefly on earlier and later bacteriological researches, and occasionally perhaps a trifle too dogmatically. Not all authorities would agree, for instance, with the assumption on page 23 that the specific organism responsible for acute rheumatism has as yet been finally identified, or with the assertion on page 44 that life is " nothing more than a chemical reaction." Dr. Bankoff also introduces the subject of artificial in- semination and gives his own views thereon, and his final chapter is devoted to Lourdes and the visions of Bernadette Soubirous. He suggests that the miraculous cures subsequently associated with the shrine and its spring may in some cases, particularly in certain affections of the skin, have really been due to penicillin contained in the water, this being originally derived from the village refuse at one time dumped in its neighbourhood.
Previous page
