London.-Cancer experts on this
side think there must be some mistake
in Mr. Taft's special message to con
gress in which he asked for an appro
priation of $50,000 for the investiga
tion of cancer in fishes. Cabled re
ports make the president say that
• close investigation of the subject of
cancer in fishes, which are freuently
swept away by epidemics of that dis
ease, may give us light upon this
dreadful human scourge." Dr. Bash
ford, director of the Imperial Cancer
Research Fund, says that there must
be some misconception here.
"Fishes are swept away by goitre,
not by cancer," he says. "The miscon
ception has arisen because cancer
sometimes follows upon goitre.
"I do not mean that cancer does not
attack fishes, but the subject which
has given rise to Mr. Taft's request for
another laboratory is that of goitre,
upon which aspect of the question the
Imperial Cancer Research fund has
been engaged for a long time past. As
a result of investigations spread over
the entire British empire, which be
gan in 1902, it was found that the dis
ease existed throughout the verte
brate scale.
"In particular, it was found that
trout which were kept in hatcheries
for stock purposes were very liable to
a disease of the thyroid gland, very
similar to goitre, and this not infre
quently went on to the development
of cancer. Cancer, as distinct from
that which :ollows upon goitre, has
been found in fish from the sea, but
never in any frequency which would
justify the theory of an epidemic. As
a matter of fact, investigators consider
it to be established that cancer is not
infectious."
Invasion of Teddy Bugs.
