REINHARD 



when they were more free of acute infectious disease. Elder resi- 

 dents of St. Lawrence Island have recounted to the author how, in 

 the "old days", from fall to spring they could expose themselves to 

 chill and fatigue, yet never have a "cold", pneumonia, or other acute 

 infectious disease. However, the first boat of spring arriving from 

 the mainland would bring with it as invisible cargo acute infectious 

 disease; particularly upper respiratory disease. Thereafter, sick- 

 ness would be common on the island until freezup, when cessation 

 of traffic from the mainland occurred. Similar experiences were 

 common throughout the Arctic in years past. Many are the accounts 

 of introduction of disease into arctic villages through the advent of 

 people from areas with more concentrated population. Repeatedly, 

 epidemic diseases such as smallpox, measles, influenza, and whoop- 

 ing cough decimated the population in individual villages, affecting 

 young and old alike. 



The general epidemiological patterns of the past are not generally 

 applicable to the Arctic today; particularly not in the Western Amer- 

 ican Arctic. Most villages are in relatively close communication with 

 urban areas because of a well-developed air transport system. 

 There is extensive human traffic throughout the year, and now, 

 therefore, very few villages experience the traditional freedom 

 from acute infectious disease during the colder seasons. Recent 

 epidemiological studies of St. Lawrence Island residents have shown 

 the year-round occurrence of acute infectious disease (Reinhard, 

 1956). However, this epidemiological shift has not been recognized 

 widely. Perhaps it has been poorly documented. Therefore, in the 

 concepts of the large group of medical and public health profession- 

 als in the more populated southerly areas, the Arctic still is the 

 place where people are exposed only sporadically to infectious dis- 

 ease and are hypersusceptible toitwhenitis introduced. The native 

 arctic population is presumed to be immunologically underdeveloped. 



Adherence to these obsolete concepts caused considerable alarm 

 among those concerned with native health when a severe epidemic of 

 poliomyelitis occurred in Anchorage and Fairbanks, Alaska in 1953- 

 54. Previous severe epidemics in Greenland (Fog-Foulsen, 1955) 

 and the eastern Canadian Arctic (Peart, 1949 ; Adamson, et al., 1949; 

 Johnsen and Wood, 19 54) had caused great morbidity and mortality 

 among the native people in those areas. It was feared that similar 



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