Licence: In copyright
Credit: The prevention of malaria. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.
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![[1904], to which no reply has been given; and also by Sewell [1904], Giles [1904], and others. No one who is acquainted with the nature of scientific evidence can imagine for a moment that this experiment gave any proof of anything connected with the subject. The measurements of malaria were of the most inadequate nature, and were based upon the most insufficient random sampling —while in some cases the number of children examined was not recorded (section 31 (8)). The enumeration of mosquitos was evidently of an equally casual nature, the authors not having been able to devise any accurate method. Neither report was well written, and the second one was worded so confusedly that almost anything might be inferred from it. Both reports claimed that the mosquitos increased in spite of the reduction measures. This is, of course, possible to a certain extent (section 29 (8)); but it is otherwise mathematically impossible, and the statement suggests only that the authors' methods were inaccurate. As no exact enumeration of the mosquitos had been made before the operations, the total result of the work could not be determined. In fact the reader who is interested in exact work will do well to compare these reports with Chapter VI, if only to learn what not to do as regards the measurement of malaria and of mosquitos, and the conduct of a campaign. It has been frequently claimed by several Indian writers on the prevention of malaria, that the operations at Mian Mir were carried out merely to determine the practical feasibility of mosquito reduction for a reasonable cost in India. Even this claim cannot be accepted. During the first year (1902) only 7,216 rupees were expended for dealing with an area of 4 square miles containing numbers of troops, and of this sum, 5,364 rupees were spent on bricking, lining and plastering a single watercourse, leaving only 1,851 rupees, or about £120 for the rest of the work. This is hardly a convincing ex- penditure for a test experiment. The life of a single soldier](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21351600_0642.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
