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SEVEN years ago there were 1,712 unhospitalized people in Mississippi with known active tuberculosis, 90 percent of whom were not receiving any sort of care; and there were 783 beds for tuberculosis patients, 777 of them occu¬ pied. New cases were being discovered every day. Four years later this backlog of cases had been cleared up, and by 1956 nearly 85 percent of the newly reported cases were being treated.How was this done?"By building more tuberculosis hospital fa¬ cilities," probably would be the answer of people familiar with tuberculosis control and the rec¬ ommendations for hospitalization.But there was one big difficulty. Among the 48 States in the Union at that time, Mississippi ranked 48th in both per capita and spendable family income. Obviously, this solution was out.Although there were in existence drugs that were successful in treating tuberculosis, their cost and difficulty of administration made any sort of mass approach impractical. Then isoniazid came along and a successful formula was found: isoniazid, in combination with other drugs, and enthusiasm, administered in equal parts. With this formula, the Mississippi State Board of Health made a new approach to the Dr. Blakey is director of preventable disease control, Mississippi State Board of Health. The other au¬ thors are with the Bureau of State Services of the Public Health Service: Dr. Hofstra as chief of Pro¬ gram Services, Chronic Disease Branch; Miss Gilbertson as public health nursing consultant, and Miss Wyman as public health adviser, Tuberculosis Branch.

RABIES VACCINATION FOR POLIOMYELITISTo the Editor:\p=m-\Considerablepublicity has been given recently in the lay press to the use of rabies vaccination for prophylaxis of poliomyelitis. Since rabies vaccine has the possible hazard of producing allergic encephalomyelitis in vaccinated persons, it should obviously be used only when there are proved indications. The following immunologic studies of the relationship between the poliomyelitis and rabies viruses were carried out in my laboratory.Groups of Swiss mice were vaccinated at weekly intervals with three intraperitoneal injections (0.5 cc.) of ultraviolet irradiated poliomyelitis or rabies vaccines. The irradiated poliomyelitis and rabies vaccines were completely inactivated and prepared as previously (J. Immunol. 50:317 and 331, 1945). On the 21st day after the first vaccination, the mice were given approximately 10 and 100 LD50 units of the Lansing strain of poliomyelitis virus or fixed rabies virus. In a series of three experiments involving over 200 mice, no evidence of cross immunity was found between the poliomyelitis and rabies viruses. In other experiments hyperimmune Lansing antiserum failed to neutralize the rabies virus and hyperimmune rabies antiserum did not neutralize the Lansing virus. On the other hand, in every experiment the vaccine or hyperimmune serum tested showed significant protection against homologous virus. These findings are contrary to recent reports in the lay press that rabies vac¬ cination may protect man against poliomyelitis.

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