Sleei'inu Sickness in the ANtiLO-EaYi'Ti.vN Sudan 



being a 



NOTE ON THE A UMINISTBATI VE HEASUUES THAT HAVE BEEN TAKEN IN THE SOUTHEUN SUDAN 

 TO DEAL WITH THE ADVANCE OP SLEEPING SICKNESS NORTHWARDS PROM UGANDA, THE LADO, 



BELGIAN COKGO AND PBENCH CONGO 



BY 



Colonel H. B. BIathias, D.S.O., R.A.M.G., P.M.O.E.A,. 



President, Smlan Sleeping Sickness Commission 



Dr. Andrew Balfour has asked me to write a short note on the above subject for 

 the Fourth Eeport of the Wellcome Tropical Eesearch Laboratories and I gladly do so. 



In the Third Eeport (1908), extracts from Captain Howard Ensor's report to the 

 Sudan Sleeping Sickness Commission appeared, and in these extracts all that was then 

 known of the distribution of tsetse flies, both G. palpalis and G. morsitans, in the 

 Bahr-El-Ghazal was set forth, and the question as to whether sleeping sickness existed 

 at that time in the Province discussed, without its being possible to give a definite 

 answer one way or another. Certain recommendations were, however, made by this 

 Officer, and, acting on these, and from the general information contained in his report, 

 it was decided by the Sudan Government to despatch a British Medical Officer in the British 

 autumn of 190S to the Bahr-El-Ghazal, and Captain E. G. Anderson, E.A.M.C, attached ^^^'^'"^^ . 



■^ Officer detailed 



to the Egyptian Army, was selected. for "Sleeping 



He was ordered to travel over, and investigate the conditions existing in, the S"=''"*=^^ 

 southern portions of the Bahr-El-Ghazal (its southern frontier and immediately 

 adjacent states) which have a more direct bearing on the gradual invasion of sleeping 

 sickness from the south. 



Leaving Khartoum in November, 1908, he proceeded to Shambe on the White 

 Nile, thence south by way of M'volo and Meridi to the Eiver Sueh, carrying out the 

 routine examination of the inhabitants by the way and afterwards returning and 

 traversing the northern frontier of the Lado. He paid special attention to the 

 upper portion of the Eiver Yei, and the villages Amadi, Dego and Dai, which were 

 suspected centres of sleeping sickness, and then crossed to the southern limits of 

 Mongalla Province on the Nile. With regard to the information obtained by him, it 

 will be sufficient to mention here that not a single case of sleeping sickness could be 

 found, and that after five months of arduous travel, as the rains were starting, making 

 further progress in the southern Bahr-El-Ghazal almost impossible, he was ordered to 

 return to Headquarters and write his report. 



Captain Anderson brought to notice among other things the important fact that a Natural 

 barrier exists to the east of the Bahr-El-Ghazal against the inroad of sleeping sickness. ^"'"^ 



'-' X o ) against 



consisting of a large area devoid of permanent open water of any sort, which stretches Sleeping 

 from the Eiver Yei to the Nile. Also in Mongalla Province, between Mongalla station ^"^l^"^^^ 

 and Gebel Lafone (some 60 or 70 miles) there is an extensive plain, very thinly 

 populated, devoid of permanent open water and free from tsetse flies, and farther 

 eastward still, towards Abyssinia, the country is reported to be desolate and uninhabited. 

 On reference to Map (Fig. 7) it will be observed, as pointed out by Captain Anderson, that 



