Yellow Fever and its Transmission J) 



In an editorial in "The Journal" of February 23, I notice an allusion 

 to some variances between my own views and those of Drs. Reed, Carroll 

 and Agramonte on the subject of the transmission of yellow fever through 

 the agency of mosquitoes. Lest this difference of opinion should be 

 misunderstood or its purport exaggerated, I beg to make the following 

 statements : 



My readiness to accept the incontrovertible demonstration brought 

 forward by those gentlemen as to the transmissibility of yellow fever 

 through the agency of the Culex mosquito — wrongly assimilated, it ap- 

 pears, to the C. fascitus — was a foregone conclusion, inasmuch as I had 

 asserted and experimentally demonstrated to my own satisfaction the 

 identical fact trwenty years ago. This circumstance did not influence my 

 judgment, however, in any degree, and only added to my admiration of 

 the very perfect manner in which the recent investigation was carried 

 out. I also have always supposed that this particular species of mosquito 

 must be the natural agent of transmission through which the disease is 

 riormally propagated in Havana, probably to the exclusion of the other 

 species, since its biologic requirements agree very thoroughly with 

 the usual course of yellow fever epidemics in this city, whereas those of 

 the other species do not. The point, however, has not been experimentally 

 investigated, and it is quite possible that, in other yellow fever centers 

 other species of that genus may be found to assume the role assigned to the 

 Culex mosquito in Havana. 



The most important and original discovery made by Drs. Reed, Carroll 

 and Agramonte, in their interesting investigations, and that which, above 

 all other considerations, entitles them to our warmest praise and congratu- 

 lation, is the fact which they have brought to light showing that, under 

 certain conditions which they have accurately precised, for the particular 

 season of the year in which they were experimenting, it is possible to con- 

 taminate a mosquito through one single bite on a case of yellow fever, so 



1) Reprinted from the Journal of the American Medical Association, April 13, 1901 

 md Sevista de la Asociación Médico-Farmacéutica, No. 7. April 1901. 



