The fatty infiltration of the liver which follows the ingestion of medicinal liquid paraffin and many other varieties of mineral oils is more prevalent among females than among males, and is more prevalent among pigmented eye animals than among albino eye animals. When access to the oil lasts for about 30 weeks some 40 per cent, of pigmented eye females and 20 per cent. of the albino eye males may show the condition.

It is the intermediate products, lubricating oils, obtained by distillation of a crude mineral oil which contain the bulk of the constituents which lead to fatty infiltration of the liver, while it is the so-called “spirits” and the residues left in the still which tend to lead to excessive hyaline degeneration of the organs in general. There is evidence to show that fatty infiltration of the liver and hyaline degeneration of the organs are mutually antagonistic, but there is little evidence to show that either condition is directly related to the cancerous process.