Mass Infection of Body Lice with Rickettsia prowazeki.

Abstract

Summary and Conclusions

The experiments reported above indicate that human body lice fed once on a typhus-infected guinea pig at the height of the febrile period, and subsequently fed on a typhus-immune human, develop massive infection with Rickettsia prowazeki. In comparison to the rectal inoculation of lice for the preparation of the Weigl type typhus vaccine, this method of infecting lice seems to offer certain advantages.