Report of the malaria expedition to the Gambia 1902, of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and Medical Parasitology / by J. Everett Dutton ; and an appendix by F.V. Theobald.

  • Dutton, J. Everett (Joseph Everett), 1876-1905.
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Report of the malaria expedition to the Gambia 1902, of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and Medical Parasitology / by J. Everett Dutton ; and an appendix by F.V. Theobald. 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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    Up to 1899 some one hundred and twenty-two definite species of the Culicidae were described. Since that time many collections of mosquitoes have been examined from all parts of the world. Mr. F. V. Theobald, at the close of last year, as the result of an exhaustive examination of past works and new material, has remodelled the classification of the Culicidae, which he has grouped into some twenty- two genera, and has described some one hundred and thirty-six distinct new species in his Monograph on the Culicidae of the World. To this number must be added some one hundred new species which he has not yet described. As yet only a few of the great number of mosquitoes have been investigated with regard to the important point of whether or no they can act as hosts for the malaria parasite. In fact only a few species of Culex have been shown to be incapable of transmitting the disease. When it was considered that not only malaria but other diseases were con- veyed by mosquitoes, for example, filaria can develop in two genera, Culex and PanopliteSy and that yellow fever is certainly carried by one genus, Stegomyia, there arose a tendency to look upon all mosquitoes as harmful, and that their judicial destruction, as far as possible, was an object to be aimed at. How far this end can be attained is at present sub j.udice, but we have evidence that certain districts and towns lend themselves readily to this object. Experiments under this head are at present being carried on in West Africa and in Havana. On a smaller scale similar experiments have been carried out in Hong Kong and Statin Island, New York. Major Ross chose Freetown, Sierra Leone, for the scene for an experiment, to see how far mosquitoes can be diminished in a certain area, one of the most difficult places on the West Coast to tackle. He and Dr. Logan Taylor, who was to direct the work there, arrived on July 2, 1901, and at once commenced the campaign against all varieties of mosquitoes. As yet the experiment is not completed, but a great diminution in the numbers of these insects has already been brought about. In Havana the work of exterminating mosquitoes, by the destruction of their breeding places, was commenced soon after the discovery that yellow fever could be transmitted by the bites of the common mosquito, Stegomyia jasciata. Major and Surgeon W. C. Gorgas, in his January report to the Military Governor, states that out of seventeen thousand houses examined during the month by the ' Stegomyia Brigade,' in four hundred and eleven only were mosquito larvae found ; the preceding January, larvae would have been found in all of the houses. Not only have the mos- quitoes diminished, but Havana has been for the last four months, October, November, December, January, entirely free from yellow fever. This result is certainly very encouraging when we compare the prevalence of yellow fever there during the same period of the previous year, when the average number of deaths from this disease was 146-49.