Abstract
The effect of intravenous injections of dichlorethylsulphide (mustard gas) was studied in a small series of rabbits. The minimum lethal dose was found to be from 0.005 gm. to 0.01 gm. per kilo. The injection was followed by emaciation, diarrhea, and, in animals dying within a few hours following the injection, extreme restlessness, incoördinate movements, retraction of the head, and transient spasticity, but no definite paralyses or convulsions. Animals dying within twenty-four hours or so showed irregular pulmonary edema. The most interesting effects were found in the hemato-poietic system. Usually on the second day after the injection, the circulating blood showed a marked leukopenia, which in the terminal stages became extreme, leukocytes falling to 1,000 per cubic mm. or less. In animals which recovered there followed a gradual restoration to the original level. The leukopenia was accompanied by a relative but not absolute, mononucleosis. The erythrocytes appeared to be less severely injured.
A study of the bone marrow in these animals shows an effect comparable to that of benzol. There is early destruction of the cells of the granulocyte series and in some animals an extraordinary depletion of the bone marrow. Animals which partially recovered from the initial injection and were then killed, showed active regenerative changes in the bone marrow.
There is a possibility that these effects may have been due to the chlor-benzine or nitro-benzine used as a solvent in German gas shells, and carried over in the distillate used for injection. In view of the small amount of such impurity present, this does not seem likely, but there was no opportunity to repeat the experiments with dichlorethylsulphide completely freed from this solvent.
The experiments were carried out in collaboration with Capt. Morgan B. Vance, M.C., at Hanlon Field, Chaumont, France.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.