688 



covered in 1900 that the disease was transmitted by a certain species of 

 mosquito. Along the way other mosquitoes and rats, lice, fleas, flies, and 

 hundreds of invertebrate parasites were identified and their compli- 

 cated life cycles were described. 



Hwtorical Overview of World Health C ooperation 



There were times in the past when the world was more or less sharply 

 divided between diseased and non-diseased parts. Sonie nations were 

 continually afflicted with epidemics of famine and with insect- and 

 water-borne diseases while others were comparatively free of these 

 afflictions. As a result, early international policing of diseases was re- 

 stricted to efforts against tlieir spread from the underdeveloped coun- 

 tries to the developed ones. While this is still true, the lines can no 

 longer be so clearly drawni between the poor and rich nations. Today 

 the problems of world health are beginning to develop a broader base. 

 As Dubos points out : 



The worldwide urban sprawl is creating a disease pattern 

 of its own even in prosperous settlements. * * * One conse- 

 quence of the explosive growth of large cities and the urban 

 sprawl is that the old pi-oblems of air, water, and food pollu- 

 tion are re-appearing everywhere with new and intensified 

 manifestation.^ 



But it is the story of epidemic disease which is of the greater interest, 

 for it is here that formal international action in public health began. 

 It is also a contemporary stoiy, because as noted above, prosperous and 

 poor countries alike are producing conditions which may permit the 

 return of old problems. 



To provide the problem with a kind of headline flavor one does not 

 have to go back to the great pandemics that devastated the nations in 

 the Middle Ages. In fact it was only a mere n2 years ago on September 

 1 and 2, 1858, that the Staten Island Quarantine Station was attacked 

 and destroyed by angry citizens who attributed frequent epidemics of 

 yellow fever to laxity of the quarantine administration. According to 

 Russell, the local courts sustained the riot as an "act of salutary and 

 well intentioned violence." ^ 



However, in what has been an inconspicuous endeavor, the outlook 

 which has guided international health workers and government leaders 

 for many recent years is that described by Raymond B. Fosdick in 

 1945 : 



In a world that is haunted by fear and torn by hat^, public 

 health can be one of the rallying points of unity. It can be 

 one more bridge acix>ss the political and ideological gulfs that 

 divide mankind. Health is something that all nations desire, 

 and no nation by the process of gaining it takes it away from 

 another. There is not a limited supply of health for which 

 nations must compete. Rather, every nation by promoting its 

 own health adds to the better health of other nations, just, 

 as by assisting in the public health efforts of other nations 

 it protects itself.^ 



^ Rprip Diibns. "Mnn Adapting. " CNew Havpr. Talp TTn1vpr<;ltT Pfpss. If>fi5), pagps !?37-.9. 



spanl F. Russell. "Intprnatinnal Preventive MedJcine." The Scientific Monthlv (Decem- 

 ber R. 1950). pages 39S-4. 



» Austin T. Kerr, e<1. "Bulldlne the Health Bridpe : Selection from the Works of Fred L. 

 Soper, M.D." (Bloomington. Indiana I'niversity Presp. 19701. faceplate. 



