Page 22 - VHSA - Onderstepoort 100 Years - Part 1

ONDERSTEPOORT 100
the farming community in an impoverished state for many years. Government funds for research were severely restricted. The economic crisis led to political instability and in 1933 to the formation of a ‘pact’ or coalition government between the two main parties, the South African Party of Gen. Smuts and the National Party of Gen. Hertzog, accompanied by a split in the latter. The decade ended with the outbreak of World War II with its concomitant severe dis- ruption. Nevertheless the decade also saw some expansion of the facilities at Onder- stepoort, including the ‘wool’ building, (presently the administration block) in 1934 and the meat research building with abattoir in 1939, in addition to the library mentioned above. Additional land was also acquired by the purchase of the adjacent 4000 morgen farm, ‘Kaalplaas’, in 1933.
An important milestone was reached in 1933 with the publication of the first issue of the Onderstepoort Journal of Veterina- ry Science and Animal Industry, replacing the 18 volumes of the ‘Director’s Report’ which was published under various titles from 1903 to 1932. The research programme of the Institute continued unabated and yielded some extremely important results. In a 1930 letter to the Rockefeller Foun- dation eliciting financial support, du Toit listed 66 main areas of research and stated,
22 ‘Onderstepoort is in many respects perhaps
the largest and best equipped veterinary
research laboratory in the world. The name
is well known to every man working in this
world’. Though perhaps exaggerated, results obtained during this period serve to support this view.
The first issue of the Onderstepoort Journal of Veterinary Science and Animal Industry was published in 1933
The ‘Wool Building’ was completed in 1934
“In a 1930 letter to the Rockefeller Foundation eliciting financial support, du Toit listed 66 main areas of research and stated, ‘O nderstepoor t is in many respects perhaps the largest and best equipped veterinary research laboratory in the world’.”
Building upon the ground-breaking work of Theiler and his collaborators on the role of phosphate deficiency in the aetio- logy of botulism and growth defects, du Toit and his team of biochemists, including A.I. Malan, J.G. Louw, J.W. Groenewald and others completed a long series of ‘Studies in Mineral Metabolism’ which remained the benchmark in this field for many years. The problem posed by na- gana in Natal continued to receive much attention. B. Parkin introduced antimosan therapy for trypanosome infections which proved to be effective but prohibitively expensive. Following Curson’s studies on the distribution of nagana, R.H.T.P. Harris
field all over the
developed his famous trap for the capture of tsetse flies in 1930. By 1933 no less than 26 000 traps had been installed, resulting in a substantial reduction in the numbers of flies caught and also in the incidence of the disease, raising hopes that it might suffice to eradicate the disease. It was later found not to fulfil this expectation.
Combating East Coast fever by means of the compulsory short-interval dipping of all cattle in order to control the carrier brown ear tick was mainly the responsibility of the veterinary field services. The examination of blood smears to detect infection was later shared by Onderstepoort staff, however, and in 1930 no less than 237 889 smears were processed. In 1935 only 46 new outbreaks occurred.
The lamsiekte saga also continued with the identification by Robinson in 1930 of Clostridium botulinum types C and D as the organisms responsible for the production of the bacterial toxins causing the disease. In 1938 Mason, Steyn and Bisschop developed the first effective formol-toxoid vaccine against the disease now called botulism. This vaccine became especially important during the World War II, when sufficient bone meal
PART 1
Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute: General History
1908-2008
Years