Milford chronicle., 1962-12-14
Yellow Fever Mosquito
Threatens U. 5. Health
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tropic - excited by light Any dis
turbance In the forest which in
creases the amount of light stimu-
lates spegazzinii into a vigorous
attack upon the nearest warm
blooded animal. Since man seems
to cause the greatest disturbance
in the forest. he frequently gets
bitten.
Man then returns to his COM
munfty a place spegazzini dis
dains-and If there are any aegypti
around may infect them. This, in
turn, could touch off new epi-
demic.
Although the United States has
no jungles, it still may not be i'm
hume to jungle yellow fever. Since
194S, when the monkey-borne dis
ease leaped the Panama canal, it
has been creeping steadily north
ward and now fringes southern
Mexico.
This would be no cause for
alarm except for the fact that yell
low fever has now been shown to
infect certain small mammals that
don't necessarily live in the jungle.
And il may be that another type
of mosquito, found on both sides of
the Rio Grande, is the culprh
carrying yellow fever from man.
NAL to mammal, and perhaps even
mammal to man.
Thus, yellow fever may creep
into the U. S. like a "wetback"
from Mexico, as well as arriving
by jet.
Columbus was perhaps the first
white man to see yellow fever.
He described a case in mis- journal,
written in 1895,
Over the next 400 years aegypti
dined sumptuously on explorers
and settlers, and seemed to have a
special liking for military expedi-
tions. More than half of the 49,
OOO-man English army that occu-
pied Havana in 1862 fell victim to
yellow fever and French army.
$4,000 strong, was virtually wiped
out in Santo Domingo by the dis
ease. During the Spanish-Ameri-
can War, more soldiers died from
aegypti bites than fell to enemy
bullets.
In the United States epidemics
have struck as far north as Bos-
ton. New York had seven major
epidemics and Philadelphia IL.
New Orleans became a storm CEN
ter of the disease. Eight thousand
OF its citizens died In 1858 and 25
years later yellow fever claimed
another 5000 lives there. During
1878 more than 100 communities IN
Louisiana. Mississippi and Tennes-
see were invaded Cases numbered
10000 and 10000 died
But if New Orleans knew the
scourge Of the aegypti onslaught,
1t also knew triumph. For there
in 1905 DR.. William Gorgas stamp
ed out the last epidemic to hit the
United States. Significantly, he
performed this medical miracle of
the time by eradicating aegypti. 1t
was probably the only concen-
trated attack ever made on the
mosquito in this country.
With the experience gained at
New Orleans, DR. Gorgas wiped out
yellow fever across the Isthmus of
Panama five years later and made
possible construction Of the canal
"a feat the French were forced
to abandon because OF yellow
fever.
DIR. Gorgas' success sprang di-
rectly from the work of DR.. Carlos
]. Finlay. son of French inn
migrant to Cuba. After graduating
from medical school In the United
States and setting up practice in
Havana, DR.. Finlay went to work
on number of medical riddles,
including leprosy, cholera and can
Ger.
He long theorized that yellow
fever was carried by mosquitoes
and in 1881 first suggested that
the mosquito might be Aedes
aegypti. Eradicate the mosquito,
he predicted. and yellow fever
would be finished.
His words, however, were prac-
tically ignored. He could furnish
no proof. since he did not under
stand that an incubation period in
the mosquito was necessary, and
his colleagues were busy pursuing
the cause OF yellow fever in other
fields.
Then in 1900 the fourth U. s.
Commission for the Study of Yell
low Fever went to Cuba under the
direction of DR.. Walter Reed, a
major in the Army Medical Corps.
At that time hopes of finding the