Food Poisoning Victims May Get Exam Excuses

Definite diagnosis of the food poisoning plague which struck hundreds of House residents Friday seemed almost certain last night, as two University experts reached a tentative verdict.

Meanwhile Dr. Arlie V. Bock of the Hygiene Department gave assurance that all who can establish that they suffered n hour exams from attacks would be granted legitimate excuses.

A partial solution to the mystery emerged from a weekend conference between Associate Sanitation Inspector Edward W. Moore, and Dr. Shih Lu Change, assistant professor of Sanitary Biology. They held the milk and gravy, rather than the roast beef, as responsible the illness.

Experts in a Quandry

In agreement with his colleague, Dr. Moore held the cause of the epidemic as emanating from toxin generating sta-phylococus bacteria. He was forced to qualify this judgment, however, since he had no cultures of the suspected food to work on.

Absence of samples, Moore charged, was an oversight. "Specimens of all food served are always kept in the Army," he said. "From now on they will be kept at Harvard."

Some negligence in refrigeration, Moore and Change concurred, was probably responsible for the illness of those students who ate Thursday evening meals in Leverett, Eliot, Winthrop, Lowell, and Kirkland. Only those taking their meals in Dunster and Adams, who do not serve from the central Kirkland kitchen, escaped.

Chang Starts Alone

When the epidemic struck, Dr. Chang began the investigation alone, since Dr. Moore was held at a medical conference in Washington until Saturday. His preliminary investigations inclined him to a "milk or gravy" hypothesis.

"It was definitely not the roast beef," Chang declared. "I think the difficulty stemmed from the milk or gravy served."

Both noted that the particular bacteria involved were not of themselves harmful if taken cold internally. Only if they are allowed to get warm, within food they produce a toxious substance which produced observed reactions of dysentery and nausea.