CHAPTER III 



A General Survey of the Needs of Entomological Sanitation in 



America ^ 



W. Dwight Pierce 



Notwithstanding the great amount of publicity which has been given 

 the Anti-fly Campaign, one will find throughout our land a rather 

 general disregard of the danger from flies. Certain newspapers keep 

 the subject annually before their readers, but on the whole, public co- 

 operation is slight, A few cities and communities have definitely organ- 

 ized mosquito control work, and the Public Health Service has done a 

 wonderful amount of work in organizing such efforts. From an ento- 

 mological standpoint our nation is not sanitary. The reason lies in the 

 fact that the public does not yet realize that insects can and do carry 

 disease. Science has apparently not put forward the idea in such a 

 manner that it has gripped the average person. Until we do this we 

 cannot expect public cooperation in the attempt to put down insect- 

 spread diseases. 



The problems we have to meet may be divided in several diff^erent 

 manners. We may separate them into problems of municipalities, towns 

 and villages, and rural communities. We ma^^ look at them from the 

 standpoint of the farm, the home, the market, the factory, and the 

 institution. They may be sorted out as problems of drainage, waste 

 disposal, screening, animal control, etc. 



Of course we have a greater diversity of entomological control prob- 

 lems in a municipality, but we also have more people who give attention 

 to matters of health in a city, and who would complain against un- 

 healthful conditions. On the other hand, while the problems of the rural 

 community and town are fewer, the insect conditions often become greatly 

 aggravated because of total carelessness as to sanitation. This careless- 

 ness in small towns and farms is usually due either to ignorance or lack 

 of organized efi'ort for community betterment. 



The field of the sanitary entomologist who desires to tread virgin soil 

 is therefore to solve the ways and means of obtaining better fly and 

 mosquito conditions in rural communities. Educational work must be 



' This lecture was mimeographed and circulated to the class in January and ap- 

 peared in parts in The American City, for February and March, 1919. 



34 



