Should Leg Weakness in Growing Chicks Be Called Rickets?*

The authors (1, 2), as well as other investigators (3) in the field of poultry nutrition, have called the condition in growing chicks, popularly known as leg weakness, rickets. The use of the term rickets is in harmony with the idea expressed by Park (4) in a discussion of the etiology of rickets in which he states, “Increasing knowledge concerning rickets has made it necessary to broaden the view in regard to the characteristic pathology and admit to the disease all disturbances in metabolism in which lime salt cease to be deposited in the bones and cartilage.” Pappenheimer and Dunn (5) in a recent paper entitled “The Relation of Leg Weakness in Growing Chicks to Mammalian Rickets” have taken the position that leg weakness in chicks should not beclassified as rickets. Although they do not make a definite statement tothis effect, in the addendum to their article they do state that a certain lot of chicks on a yellow corn diet did not develop rickets while Table I of their article shows that these chicks did develop leg weakness. In support of this view they make the following statement in the discussion of their results: