100 JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 6 



the Bureau of Entomology has been conducting in cooperation with 

 the Thompson-McFadden Commission of the New York Postgraduate 

 School of Medicine, has failed to reveal any circumstance that tends 

 to connect Simulium with pellagra transmission. In this work, by 

 means of special facilities provided, an extremely exhaustive investi- 

 gation of pellagra in a rather restricted locality was conducted. A 

 house to house canvass was carried out and complete accounts of the 

 histories and surroundings of cases were compiled Simulium is present, 

 but not in sufficient numbers and not in the exact places where it 

 would appear possible that they were connected with the disease. 



Mr. S. J. Hunter: We talked that over quite fully, Dr. Siler of 

 the Army Medical Corps and I, and both of us spoke of the fact that 

 it was remarkable that a purely geographical theory should receive 

 so much attention. Dr. Siler explains it on the grounds that Sambon 

 seems to be a good prognosticator. For example. Dr. Siler spoke of 

 visiting peasant huts with Dr. Sambon, where cattle and people lived 

 under the same roof. Here the stable fly was feeding on both the 

 cattle and peasant. Dr. Sambon remarked to Dr. Siler that there 

 would in all probability be an outbreak of Anthrax here soon. And 

 such an outbreak did shortly occur. One of Sambon's deductions, if 

 frequently corroborated, must certainly be considered as important 

 in its relation to hi> theory. That is, parents and children may all 

 be pellagrins, living in a Sand-fly zone but when the family moves 

 out of the Sand-fly zone subsequent offspring are free from Pellagra. 



Mr. W. a. Riley: I should like to inquire whether there are any 

 further data relative to the susceptibility to pellagra of the monkeys 

 which are being experimented upon. It is well-known that the typical 

 insect-borne diseases may be transmitted from animal to animal by 

 transfusion of blood as well as by the insect host. This is true of 

 malaria, yellow fever, Texas fever of cattle, and various trypanosome 

 and other diseases. As I recall the report of last year, there Avas no 

 evidence that the monkeys were affected by transfusion of blood from 

 a pellagrin. 



S. J. Hunter: That is a question we discussed last year. The 

 monkey has been tried in every shape and form. Transfusions of liv- 

 ing blood, inoculation of various organs and tissues taken from 

 recently deceased subjects gave negative results. In this particular, 

 Infantile Paralysis differs in that it was produced experimentally 

 before being carried through the agency of the stable fly. 



Mr. W. a. Riley: In view of the known difficulty in carrying on 

 experiments regarding the insect transmission of disease, would it 

 not be important to first determine the suceptibility of the animals 

 experimented upon. If the animals are not susceptible of course 



