14 Colonel David Bruce [Jan. 24, 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 



Friday, January 24, 1908. 



Sir Jaxes Crichton-Browne, M.D. LL.D. F.R.S., Treasurer 

 and Vice-President, in the Chair. 



Colonel David Bruce. R.A.M.C. C.B. D.Sc. F.R.S. 



The Extinction of Malta Fever. 



The subject of this evening's discourse is the Extinction of Malta 

 Fever, and I propose to brino* before you in this paper the various 

 steps in the investigation of tliis disease wliich led up to the discovery 

 of its mode of spread, and so to its prevention and extinction. 



Historical. 



This fever has been studied in various ways for the last quarter 

 of a century, but it was not until 1904 that the Government, alarmed 

 by the great wastage in man caused by it, took the matter up seriously, 

 and asked the Royal Society to undertake a thorough investigation 

 of the disease. This the Royal Society agreed to do, and early in 

 the summer of the same year sent out to Malta a small Connnission 

 for this purpose ; and it is princi])ally the result of the work of the 

 Connnission which I have the honour of Ininging before you this 

 evening. 



It seems a pity that this research was not undertaken twenty years 

 earlier, as during this time, some 14,000 or 15,000 soldiers and sailors 

 have suffered from the disease. It is to be hoped that the result of 

 this work will bring home to the Government the great good to be 

 gained by introducing scientific methods of research into the study of 

 disease in the Army. This, strange as it may seem, has not yet come 

 home to Government departments. If an application was made to 

 the Treasury to-morrow for, say, 100/. for such scientific purposes, 

 the answer would be that it was not the function of the Royal Army 

 Medical Corps to engage in scientific research, but that their duty was 

 to attend to the sick soldiers. This waiting till a man is sick is fatal. 

 It ought to be our chief duty to anticipate and prevent sickness. 



Before I leave the subject of the Commission, I may remark tliat 

 its work went on for three years before the successful result was 

 attained. 



But now to return to Malta fever. 



