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Infectious Rats and Dangerous Cows: Transnational Perspectives on Animal Diseases in the First Half of the Twentieth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 July 2011

CORNELIA KNAB
CORNELIA KNAB*
Affiliation:
Universität Heidelberg, Cluster Asia and Europe, Voßstraße 2, Building 4400, 69115 Heidelberg, Germany; Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

From the late nineteenth century onwards, the danger of animal diseases crossing national borders became increasingly apparent. The vast increase in the global trade in animals and animal products turned such diseases into a threat to both economic relations and public health, and called for international attention. Governments and groups of transnational experts began to develop cross-border networking strategies to counter the spread of animal diseases. Significant new developments started after the First World War with the establishment of a number of international animal health institutions, along with the Office International des Epizooties in Paris and the Veterinary Subcommittees of the League of Nations. This article traces the work of these two international animal health agencies and the interaction between their role as intergovernmental platforms and their capacity to define their own terms of reference.

Rats infectieux et vaches dangereuses: perspectives transnationales sur les maladies animales pendant la première moitié du xxème siècle

Vers la fin du XIXème siècle la propagation transfrontalière des maladies animales commence à émerger comme question difficile pour la politique internationale. Grâce à l'expansion foudroyante du commerce global des animaux et des produits animaliers, les épizooties posent une menace au progrès économique et à la santé humaine, nécéssitant de façon urgente des mesures internationales. Gouvernements et groupes transnationaux d'experts s'efforcent de créer des réseaux internationaux pour élaborer des stratégies anti-épizootiques internationales, mais ce n'est qu'après la Première Guerre Mondiale que s'annoncent des innovations effectives: la création de plusieurs institutions internationales telles que l'Office International des Epizooties (Paris) et les comités vétérinaires de la Ligue des Nations. Cet article retrace les travaux et interactions de ces deux organismes pendant l'entre-deux-guerres et contemple le champ d'action potentiel des organisations internationales prises entre leur fonction de plateforme intergouvernementale et leur volonté de développer une capacité d'interprétation autant autonome qu'internationale.

Ansteckende ratten und gefährliche kühe: transnationale perspektiven auf tierkrankheiten in der ersten hälfte des zwanzigsten jahrhunderts

Seit dem ausgehenden 19. Jahrhundert stellten Tierseuchen, die sich über Staatsgrenzen hinweg ausbreiteten, ein zunehmendes Problem der internationalen Politik dar. Der massive Aufschwung des globalen Handels mit Tieren und Tierprodukten machte die Ausbreitung von Tierseuchen zu einem ökonomischen und gesundheitspolitischen Risiko, das internationale Maßnahmen dringend erforderlich machte. Sowohl Regierungen als auch transnationale Expertenversammlungen bildeten grenzübergreifende Netzwerke, um Strategien für ein internationales System der Tierseuchenbekämpfung zu entwickeln. Wirksame Neuerungen erfuhr das Problemfeld allerdings erst nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg mit der Einrichtung verschiedener internationaler Institutionen, dem Internationalen Tierseuchenamt (Office International des Epizooties, OIE) und den Völkerbunds-Subkommissionen für Veterinärfragen. Der Artikel verfolgt die Arbeiten und die Interaktionen dieser beiden internationalen Tierseuchengremien in der Zwischenkriegszeit und erörtert die Handlungsfähigkeit von internationalen Organisationen zwischen ihrer Funktion als intergouvernementale Plattformen und der Entwicklung einer eigenen internationalen Deutungshoheit.

Type
Articles
Information
Contemporary European History , Volume 20 , Issue 3: Transnational Cooperation in Food, Agriculture, Environment and Health in Historical Perspective , August 2011 , pp. 281 - 306
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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References

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15 In Feb. 2011, the First One Health World Congress on animal, human and environmental interaction was held in Melbourne: www.fao.org/ag/againfo/home/en/index.htm (last visited 15 March. 2011). For veterinary perspectives on historical and current concepts between animal and human medicine see Tjaart W. Schillhorn van Veen, ‘One Medicine: The Dynamic Relationship between Animal and Human Medicine in History and at Present’, Agriculture and Human Values, 15 (1998), 115–120; Calvin W. Schwabe, ‘Interactions between Human and Veterinary Medicine: Past, Present and Future’, in Michell, History of the Healing Professions, 119–133.

16 About the development of these connections during several centuries see Ferrières, Sacred Cow.

17 Osterhammel, Jürgen, Die Verwandlung der Welt. Eine Geschichte des 19. Jahrhunderts (München: Beck, 2009)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Osterhammel's chapter (pp. 268–294) about the role of diseases in the context of nineteenth-century global changes is an interesting synthesis of the problem area of epidemic diseases in its political and cultural contexts.

18 On the cattle plague and its consequences for British agriculture, see Fisher, John R., ‘British Physicians, Medical Science, and the Cattle Plague, 1865–66’, Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 67, 4 (1993), 651–69Google ScholarPubMed. About the cattle plague in general and its historical impact in a global context, see the comprehensive work by Spinage, Clive A., Cattle Plague: A History (New York: Kluwer/Plenum, 2003)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

19 For several decades, the most comprehensive work on all aspects of meat hygiene was von Ostertag, Robert, Handbuch der Fleischbeschau (Stuttgart: F. Enke, 1904)Google Scholar. Until the 1930s, the book appeared in numerous editions and several languages.

20 On the economic disputes on presumably contaminated meat in the context of the so-called ‘pork wars’ of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries see Kastner, Justin J., Sanitary Related International Trade Disputes: A Multiple-Factor Analysis Based on Nineteenth-Century Precedents (PhD, Ottawa: National Library of Canada, 2004)Google Scholar; also Spiekermann, Uwe, ‘Dangerous Meat? German-American Quarrels over Pork and Beef, 1870–1900’, Bulletin of the German Historical Institute, 46 (Spring 2010), 93–110Google Scholar. Zylberman, ‘Making food safety an issue’, 6–16.

21 For a critical view on the characteristics of the bacteriological revolution see Worboys, Michael, ‘Was there a Bacteriological Revolution in Late Nineteenth-Century Medicine?’, Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 38 (2007), 20–42CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22 Worboys, Michael, ‘“Killing and Curing”: Veterinarians, Medicine and Germs in Britain, 1860–1900’, Veterinary History, 7, 2 (1992), 53–71Google ScholarPubMed.

23 Eijkman, Pieter H., L'Internationalisme Médical (Amsterdam: Van Rossen, 1910)Google Scholar; L'Internationalisme Scientifique (Den Haag: Van Stockum, 1911). On Eijkman's collections and his motivations for collecting accounts of international events, see Somsen, Geert J., ‘Science, Medicine, and Arbitration: Pieter Eijkman's World Capital in The Hague’, in Kemperink, Mary, Vermeer, Leonieke, eds, Utopianism and the Sciences (Leuven: Peeters Publishing, 2009), 125–144Google Scholar. A later, very detailed compilation of international medical and scientific movements, conferences and organisations was established during the 1930s by the state library (Staatsbibliothek) in Berlin. See Stümke, Hans, ed., Bibliographie der Internationalen Medizinischen Kongresse und Verbände (Leipzig: Otto Harrasowitz, 1939)Google Scholar. For international organisations and activities between the two World Wars, compiled by the League of Nations’ Handbook of International Organisations Series, see the research database www.lonsea.org (last visited: 15 March, 2011).

24 For the international sanitary conferences of the nineteenth century see Huber, Valeska, ‘The Unification of the Globe by Disease? The International Sanitary Conferences on Cholera, 1851–1894’, Historical Journal, 49, 2 (2006), 453–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Harrison, Mark, ‘Disease, Diplomacy and International Commerce: The Origins of International Sanitary Regulation in the Nineteenth Century’, Journal of Global History, 1, 2 (2006), 197–217CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25 For the first international veterinary congress, see the report by Hering, Eduard and Probstmayer, Wilhelm, eds, Amtlicher Bericht über die internationale thierärztliche Versammlung zu Hamburg am 14.-18. Juli 1863 (Stuttgart: Ebner und Schubert, 1863), for the realisation of the event see especially pp. 1–7Google Scholar.

26 The ‘Dictionnaire d'Hygiène’ by the French forensic specialist Ambroise Tardieu gives an impression of the dimensions and inflationary use of the term ‘hygiene’ in the mid and late nineteenth century. Tardieu, Ambroise, Dictionnaire d'hygiène publique et de salubrité, 4 vols., 2nd edn (Paris: Baillière, 1862)Google Scholar. A useful overview on the topics of discussion of the early international congresses on hygiene and demography was provided for the congress of 1891 by the British medical journal The Lancet: ‘The Lancet’: Reports of the International Congresses of Hygiene and Demography held from 1876 to 1889, Brussels, Paris, Turin, Geneva, The Hague, Vienna, Paris (London: Ballantyne, Hanson and Co., 1891).

27 Tenth International Veterinary Congress, Aug. 1914, Volume I (London: Bale and Sons, 1915).

28 From the Seventh International Congress of Hygiene and Demography (London, 1892), animal diseases were either included with a separate section or within the larger thematic areas of alimentary hygiene. The 1892 congress participants in particular stated the increasing relevance of the topic area: see Selly, Charles E., ed., Transactions of the Seventh International Congress of Hygiene and Demography, vol. 3: Relations of Diseases of Animals to Those of Man (London: Eyre and Spottiswoode, 1893)Google Scholar. See also the summary by Fred Smith, ‘Veterinary Hygiene’, ibid., 221–246.

29 The scientific questions about bovine tuberculosis and its possible transmission via milk and/or meat, and the usefulness of milk pasteurisation, were debated in numerous sections at the international tuberculosis conferences before the First World War and produced an immense amount of contemporary bacteriological research literature. About the contexts of the problem and the international scientific discussions (with a focus on Anglo-American debates) see Rosenkrantz, Barbara G., ‘The Trouble with Bovine Tuberculosis’, Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 59, 2 (1985), 155–175Google ScholarPubMed; Jones, Susan D., ‘Mapping a Zoonotic Disease: Anglo-American Efforts to Control Bovine Tuberculosis before World War I’, Osiris, 19 (2004), 133–148CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.

30 Private efforts of transnational co-operation, for example the work of foundations or huge international organisations such as the ICRC, were by far more prominent in other fields of public health. Animal diseases obviously did not have the reputation of being a prestigious field for international civil society engagement. Only the adversaries of biomedical research, anti-vivisectionists and anti-vaccinationists, regularly included veterinary matters within their thematic activities. See the entries in Eijkman, L'Internationalisme Scientifique; idem., L'Internationalisme Médical; and Stümke, Bibliographie der internationalen medizinischen Kongresse und Verbände.

31 A minor success was the separate international conference against rinderpest, convened in 1872 in Vienna, which drafted recommendations for common procedures by governments. Verhandlungen der Internationalen Conferenz zur Erzielung eines gleichförmigen Vorgehens gegen die Rinderpest, gehalten am 16. März bis 6. April 1872 in Wien (Wien: Kaiserlich-Königliche Staatsdruckerei, 1872). On the conference's consequences, see Spinage, Cattle Plague, 298–300; Zylberman, ‘Making Food Safety an Issue’, 4–6.

32 On the Office International d'Hygiène Publique, see Office International d'Hygiène Publique, Vingt-cinq ans d'activité de l'Office International d'Hygiène Publique, 1909–1933 (Paris : OIHP, 1933); for the later history of the OIHP and its interconnection with the League of Nations Health Organisation, see Dubin, Martin David, ‘The League of Nations Health Organisation’, in Weindling, Paul, ed., International Health Organisations and Movements, 1918–1939 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 56–80CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

33 On the concept and definitions of so-called epistemic communities of experts in an international context, see Haas, Peter M., ‘Introduction: Epistemic Communities and International Policy Co-ordination’, International Organizations, 46, 1 (1992), 1–35CrossRefGoogle Scholar. However, while Haas’ definition of epistemic communities grasps some basic elements of the evolving expert community in the area of animal health (especially the transnational networking activities and the creation of a separate professional agenda for the common good), several aspects seem different from a historical perspective, which emphasises more the processual character of scientific professionalisation and the frequent changes in scientific criteria and beliefs, as well as (in the case of many veterinarians) the aim of national economic progress.

34 Ferenc Hutyra, ‘Bericht zur Internationalen Tierseuchen-Polizei’, in Sechster Internationaler Tierärztlicher Kongress, Bern, 16. bis 21. Sept. 1895 (Bern, 1896), 173–200, and ‘Schutzmaßregeln gegen die Verbreitung von Tierseuchen im Gefolge des internationalen Viehverkehrs. Bericht und Entwurf einer internationalen Veterinär-Konvention’ in Siebenter Internationaler Tierärztlicher Kongress, Baden-Baden, 7. bis 12. Aug. 1899 (Baden-Baden: E. Köblin, 1900), 5–32. See also Lhoste, Albert, Les conventions vétérinaires internationales (doctoral thesis, Paris: Vigot Frères, 1936), 49–51Google Scholar.

35 Conférence internationale pour l'étude des épizooties, Paris, 25–28 mai 1921, préparation et procès-verbaux, première séance plénière, 25 mai 1921 (Paris: Ministère de l'Agriculture, 1921), 12–15.

36 For the motivations see the personal report published by the French minister of Agriculture: Joseph Honoré Ricard, Les Origines de la première conférence internationale des épizooties, fièvre aphteuse, peste bovine (Paris: Imprimerie de Chaix, 1921).

37 Conférence internationale pour l'étude des épizooties, première séance plénière, 25 mai 1921, 14.

38 Ibid.

39 On Emmanuel Leclainche, see Alnot, Laure and Pistre, Guilhem, ‘La vie et l'œuvre d'Emmanuel Leclainche (1861–1953)’, Bulletin de la Société Française d'Histoire de la Médécine et des Sciences Vétérinaires, 4, 1 (2005), 94–103Google Scholar.

40 Conférence internationale pour l'étude des épizooties, deuxième séance plénière, 27 mai 1921, 93–100.

41 Conférence internationale pour l'étude des épizooties, réunion de la troisième commission, 26 mai 1921, 79–92.

42 ‘Vous visez seulement les maladies infectieuses dangereuses économiquement; mais il y a des maladies qui sont dangereuses pour la santé de l'homme et cela me paraît avoir une grande importance’, ibid., 91.

43 Ibid., 92.

44 ‘Arrangement international pout la création, à Paris, d'un Office international des épizooties’, Bulletin de l'Office International des Epizooties [hereafter: Bulletin OIE], 1, 1–2 (1927–28), 1–13.

45 The OIE has so far been neglected by historians. See Peter Ludwig, Die Arbeiten des Internationalen Tierseuchenamtes in Paris seit seiner Gründung im Jahre 1921 bis zum Ausbruch des europäischen Krieges im September 1939 (PhD Universität Bern, Bern: Jules Werder, 1941). Ludwig's study, however, is merely a summary of several committee sessions. For a recent overview on contexts see Teissier, Marie, ‘A brief history of the OIE’, Bulletin OIE, 1 (2007), 6–18Google Scholar.

46 See, for example, Bulletin OIE, 4 (1930) with research issues about trypanosomiasis and tsetse flies.

47 Ludwig, Arbeiten des Internationalen Tierseuchenamtes, 65–66.

48 See, for example, several issues by Soviet researchers in Bulletin OIE, 3 (1929–30) and Bulletin OIE, 10 (1935).

49 Ludwig, Arbeiten des Internationalen Tierseuchenamtes, 69.

50 League of Nations Health Organisation, Rapport de la Conférence technique pour l'étude de la vaccination antituberculeuse par le BCG, tenue à Paris (Institut Pasteur), du 15 au 18 octobre 1928 (Genève: Société des Nations, 1928). For the history of BCG in the 1920s and 1930s, see Bonah, Christian, ‘Packaging BCG: Standardizing an Anti-Tuberculosis Vaccine in Inter-War Europe’, Science in Context, 21, 2 (2008), 279–310CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 Bulletin OIE, 2 (1928–29), 645. About the Lübeck incident, see Bonah, ‘Packaging BCG’, especially 299–302.

52 Conférence économique internationale/International Economic Conference, Report submitted to the Conference by the Agricultural Committee, 21 May 1927, League of Nations Archives [hereafter: LNA], Geneva, 10/59219/59219.

53 Conférence économique internationale, Genève, mai 1927, Rapport définitif, agriculture, lutte contre les maladies des plantes et des animaux (Genève: Société des Nations, 1927), 51.

54 International Conference for the Abolition of Import and Export Prohibitions, Geneva, 17 Oct. to 8 Nov. 1927, Final Act, Measures to Protect Animals and Plants, cited in Note by the Secretariat, Geneva, 7 Dec. 1927, LNA 10D/1275/309, 1–2.

55 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Subcommittee of Experts on Veterinary Questions, First Session, 30 Jan. 1928, LNA 10D/2049/272; see also Bulletin OIE, 1 (1927–1928), 584–588.

56 See also Clavin, Patricia, ‘Transnationalism and the League of Nations: Understanding the Work of its Economic and Financial Organisation’, Contemporary European History, 14, 4 (2005), 465–492, especially 473CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

57 The Mandates Section mentioned an interest in focusing on the problem area, but there was no obligation for the mandate powers to nominate a veterinarian representative. League of Nations, Mandates Section, Memorandum 17 Feb.1928. LNA 10D/272/272.

58 Sweetser to Drummond, 3 Feb. 1928. LNA 10D/17261/272.

59 Note from Secretary General Drummond, 11 Nov. 1930. LNA 10D/7697/272.

60 Emmanuel Leclainche, ‘La standardisation des bulletins sanitaires’, Bulletin OIE, 22 (1943), 93.

61 ‘L'Office de Génève se préoccupe essentiellement de faciliter le commerce de bétail, de faire tomber ou laisser les barrières sanitaires opposées au trafic international'. League of Nations, Economic Committee, Subcommittee of Experts on Veterinary Questions, First Session, 31 Jan. 1928, 6. LNA 10D/2049/272.

62 Ibid., 4.

63 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Subcommittee of Experts on Veterinary Questions, First Session, Report and Questionnaire, 2 Feb. 1928, 7. LNA 10D/1660/1660.

64 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Subcommittee of Experts on Veterinary Questions, First Session, Report, 31 Jan.1928, 7. LNA 10D/2049/272.

65 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Subcommittee of Experts on Veterinary Questions, Third Session, Report, 5 June 1929, 1–4. LNA 10D/12884/272.

66 International Convention for the Campaign against Contagious Diseases of Animals; International Convention concerning the Transit of Animals, Meat and Other Products of Animal Origin; International Convention concerning the Export and Import of Animal Products (other than Meat, Meat Preparations, Fresh Animal Products, Milk and Milk Products). United Nations Treaties Collection, http://treaties.un.org/Home.aspx?lang=en (last visited 15 March, 2011).

67 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Export and Import of Meat and Meat Preparations, Note by the Secretariat, March 8, 1935. LNA 10A/15577/15577.

68 Ibid.; Letter of the director of the Institut International du Froid, M. Piettre, to the League of Nations Economic Section. LNA 10A/15577/15577.

69 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Letter of invitation to Colonel Young and annotation, 4 Aug. 1938. LNA 10A/33950/33950.

70 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Committee of Experts to draw up Rules Concerning the Inspection and Wholesomeness of Meat, Draft Report, 25 Nov. 1938. LNA 10A/36175/33950. A summary of all procedures in League veterinary regulation was included in League of Nations, Economic Committee, Note by the Secretariat, 31 May 1939. LNA 10A/38438/673.

71 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Methods of Preserving Products of Animal Origin, Note by the Secretariat, 9 June 1939. LNA 10A/ 37431/37431.

72 League of Nations, Economic Committee, Note by the Secretariat, 31 May 1939, 1 (Introduction). LNA 10A/38438/673.

73 Bulletin OIE, 24 (1946), 2–7.