Imagine putting on a new pair of kid gloves and coming into contact with anthrax? I questioned the validity of this claim, but a quick search showed me that untreated goat skin products can contain anthrax spores. The incident below happened in 1921.
Anthrax Blamed On Her Kid Gloves Christmas Gift
Girl of Sixteen Stricken on Holiday Has Only Fighting Chance for Life
Because a pair of undressed kid gloves received by her Christmas are believed to have given Miss Florence Hogan, sixteen, of No. 63 Third Avenue, Astoria, anthrax, a laboratory test will be made to-day at St. Mark’s Hospital in Second Avenue to determine to what extent new kid gloves may spread the malady.
The girl has been in the hospital since Christmas Day. She has been treated with anti-anthrax serum furnished by the United States Health Service through Bellevue Hospital and the doctors say she has a fighting chance of recovery.
Anthrax contracted through gloves is so rare the case has aroused unusual interest. and among those who have gone to the hospital for clinical study are Dr. Charles Norris, Chief Medical Examiner, members of the Government Health Service and prominent local physicians.
Dr. Jacob Baley, house surgeon at St. Mark’s, who is to make to-day’s test, expressed concern over the fact that the United States Health Service was recently forced to discontinue the manufacture of the serum, the only specific relief yet devised for anthrax, and that it is becoming harder and harder to get.
Source: The Evening World newspaper. January 06, 1921. New York, N.Y.
