REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST 1908 35 
19909, Hutt Hy LL. Ent. Soc. Ont. 20th. Rep’t. 1898. p. 99-100 
A summarized account of the life history and habits of the house fly, with mention of 
a few a ¥% ociated species. 
1899 Nuttall, G.H. F. On the Role of Insects, Arachnids and Myria- 
pods as Carriers in the Spread of Bacterial and Parasitic Diseases of 
Man and Animals, a Critical and Historical Study. Johns Hopkins Hosp. 
Repitwoc= E52 
Concludes that the evidence that flies transmit anthrax is not above question. Grants 
that flies are important agents in conveying cholera and assumes that the evidence relating 
to the dissemination of this disease could safely be applied to typhoid fever. Flies ingest 
and pass tubercular bacilli. An exhaustive examination of the evidence relating to the 
dissemination of a number of diseases. An extended bibliography is given. 
1899 Reed, Walter. War Dep’t An. Rep’t, p. 627-33 
Major Reed reporting on the local epidemics of typhoid fever in the 8th cavalry and 15th 
infantry encamped near Porto Principe in February and March 1899, after detailing the 
conditions existing in the camps, states that the outbreak “‘ was clearly not due to water 
infection, but was transferred from the infected stools of patients to the food by means of 
flies, the conditions being especially favorable for this manner of dissemination.” 
1899 Veeder, M. A. The Relative Importance of Flies and Water 
Supply in Spreading Disease. Med. Record, 55:10-12 
Flies are responsible for such typhoid and other intestinal diseases as occur in small 
neighborhood epidemics extending in short leaps from house to house, without reference to 
water supply or anything else in common. Epidemics spread by flies tend to follow the 
directions of prevailing warm winds. In villages and camps where shallow open closets 
are used, giving free access of flies to the chief source of infection, the flies are the most 
important carriers. These diseases are therefore usually fly-borne in villages and camps. 
The burial of typhoid infected matter in the ground is no protection against flies. On the 
contrary it actually perpetuates it in the locality from year to year. 
1900 Howard, L.O. A Contribution to the Study of the Insect Fauna 
of Human Excrement. Wash. Acad. Sci. Proc. 2:541-600 
A detailed study of the insects breeding in human excrement, with special reference to the 
house fly and its part in disseminating typhoid fever. Unquestioned evidence is submitted 
to show that this insect may breed in human excrement, and the following conclusions from 
a paper read by Dr Vaughan before the American Medical Association at Atlantic City, 
N. J. June 6, rg900, are quoted. 
27 Flies undoubtedly served as carriers of the infection. 
My reasons for believing that flies were active in the dissemination of typhoid may be 
stated as follows: . 
a Flies swarmed over infected fecal matter in the pits and then visited and fed upon the 
food prepared for the soldiers at the mess tents. In some instances where lime had recently 
been sprinkled over the contents of the pits, flies with their feet whitened with lime were 
seen walking over the food. 
b Officers whose mess tents were protected by means of screens suffered proportionately 
less from typhoid fever than did those whose tents were not so protected. 
¢ Typhoid fever gradually disappeared in the fall of 1898, with the approach of cold 
weather, and the consequent disabling of the ye 
It is possible for the fly to carry the typhoid bacillus in two ways. In the first place fecal 
matter containing the typhoid germ may adhere to the fly and be mechanically transported. 
In the second place, it is possible that the typhoid bacillus may be carried in the digestive 
organs of the fly and may be deposited with its excrement. 
1900 Reed, Walter, Vaughan, V. C.,& Shakespeare, E. O. Abstract 
of Report on the Origin and Spread of Typhoid Fever in the U. S. 
Military Camps During the Spanish War of 1898. Washington, Gov- 
ernment Printing Office 
1901 Fletcher, James. Can. Ent. 33:84-88 
A review of Dr Howard’s paper entitled: A Contribution to the Study of the Insect Fauna 
of Human Fxcrement, and giving the more important conclusions resulting from the 
investigation. 
