Experiments to ascertain if the domestic fowl of Uganda may act as a reservoir of the virus of sleeping sickness (Trypanosoma gambiense) / by Sir David Bruce, A.E. Hamerton and H.R. Bateman.

  • David Bruce
Date:
[1911?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Experiments to ascertain if the domestic fowl of Uganda may act as a reservoir of the virus of sleeping sickness (Trypanosoma gambiense) / by Sir David Bruce, A.E. Hamerton and H.R. Bateman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    In order to discover whether Uganda fowls can act as a reservoir of the virus of Sleeping Sickness, the Commission asked themselves the following questions :— 1. Can fowls be infected with the virus of Sleeping Sickness by the bites of laboratory-bred and laboratory-infected Glossina palpalis ? 2. Can fowls transmit the virus of Sleeping Sickness (Zrypanosoma gambiense) to clean laboratory-bred Glossina palpalis ? If this is possible, can the flies so infected convey the virus to normal susceptible animals ? An answer in the affirmative to those two questions would throw suspicion on a possible avian host. To decide these points, the following experiments were devised and carried out :-— Can Fowls be Infected with the Virus of Sleeping Sickness (Trypanosoma gambiense) by the Bites of Laboratory-bred and Laboratory-infected Glossina palpalis ? The method adopted to infect the fowls was carried out as follows :—Clean Glossina palpalis, hatched out in the laboratory, were given their first feeds on a monkey whose blood contained many 7'rypanosoma gambiense. An interval of at least 24 hours was then allowed to elapse before the infected flies were first fed on the fowl. The fowl was then fed on, for varying periods, by these flies. To make certain the flies were infective, their infectivity was usually tested by their being allowed to bite normal susceptible animals during the experiment. Finally, to discover if the fowl had become infected with Trypanosona gambiense by the bites of the Glossina palpalis :— (a) The fowl’s blood was examined frequently throughout the experiment for Trypanosoma gambiense. (b) The fowl was killed and its centrifuged heart or jugular vein blood was carefully examined microscopically for 7rypanosoma gambiense. (c) Two or more cubic centimetres of the centrifuged blood were injected into a normal susceptible animal on one or more occasions during the experiment. Two typical experiments are given in detail.
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