Effect on the Immunity Mechanism of Various Avitaminoses.

Abstract

Various authors 1 , 2 , 3 have shown that avitaminosis increases the susceptibility to both bacterial invasion and to bacterial toxins.

In this laboratory, in several groups of white rats deprived of vitamins A and D, or B, or E, it has been found that the resistance to tetanus toxin, of these avitaminic animals, is very markedly diminished when compared with that of the normally nourished controls (from 40 to 100 times less).

In other series the effect of these avitaminoses on the formation of agglutinins and bacteriolysins was investigated by the usual methods of injecting typhoid bacilli, under constant conditions into avitaminic and control groups.

The results may be briefly summarized as follows:

After several injections of killed typhoid cultures, the serum of the avitaminic animals regularly showed a much lower agglutinin titre and less bacteriolytic power than that of the normally nourished controls. Following the injections of living typhoid bacilli, a similar but slighter difference was found in the serum of the avitaminic and control groups. With the injection of larger amounts of living bacilli it was manifest that this difference became progressively less. This latter finding appears to be well explained by the view that in the living cultures there were present sufficient amounts of the different vitamins to overcome, at least in part, the deficiencies of the diet. The increase in weight and the improvement of general conditions of the avitaminic rats, after receiving these larger amounts of the living cultures, seems to furnish evidence for the correctness of this view. Investigations of the effects of lack of these vitamins on the antitoxin production are under way.