Livestock Parasitology in the United States 1 



By Benjamin Schwartz 



Bureau of Animal Industry, U. S. Department of Agriculture 



[With 1 plate] 



Although the Act of the Congress of the United States establish- 

 ing the Department of Agriculture became effective in 1862, 21 years 

 elapsed before animal-disease investigations on a sustained basis were 

 undertaken by the Department. In 1883 a Veterinary Division was 

 established in the Department of Agriculture. In the next year the 

 Congress established the Bureau of Animal Industry in the place 

 of the Veterinary Division, and Daniel E. Salmon, a capable young 

 veterinarian who had made investigations for the Department of 

 Agriculture and later headed its Veterinary Division, became the 

 Chief of the new Bureau. The Bureau of Animal Industry, besides 

 being given other responsibilities, was charged with the duty "to 

 provide means for the suppression and extirpation of contagious 

 pleuropneumonia and other contagious diseases among domestic 

 animals." 



Even before the Bureau came into existence, the livestock and meat 

 industries of the United States had already developed to such an ex- 

 tent that they had sizable surpluses for export. Beef and pork, as 

 well as live animals, had been exported for a number of years to vari- 

 ous European countries. Unfortunately, several countries had placed 

 restrictions against these importations on account of disease which 

 might be conveyed to their native stock, or because of human health 

 hazard in consuming meat from diseased animals. Aside from the 

 export restrictions, American stockmen faced serious difficulties from 

 the diseases to which their stock at home was subject. Among these 

 diseases were some of parasitic origin, the nature of which either was 

 not understood, or for which effective control measures had not yet 

 been developed or put into general use. 



1 Address of the President, American Society of Parasitologists, November 16, 1951, 

 Chicago, 111. Reprinted by permission from the Journal of Parasitology, vol. 38, No. 2, 

 April 1952. 



236639—53 23 343 



