112 INSECTS AND MAN 



faecal matters, to combinations and concatenations of atmo- 

 spheric circumstances, to stone ballast, hundreds of tons of 

 which have been disinfected or thrown into the sea." 



The fight that man has made, in recent years, against 

 yellow fever, or rather against the transmitter of yellow 

 fever, is such a striking example of prophylaxis that some 

 mention must be made of the work done and of the results 

 obtained. Six great yellow-fever campaigns have been 

 carried out, and, in every case, the honours have been with 

 man. The first campaign took place in Havana, when the 

 Americans took over the administration of Cuba. Between 

 the years 1853-1900 the number of deaths in Havana alone 

 had averaged two a day. Colonel Gorgas, whose name will 

 always be writ large wherever mosquito control is the 

 subject of discussion, took the work in hand so vigorously 

 and successfully that, in 1907, only one case of yellow 

 fever was reported in Havana: one case in a city whose 

 yearly average of deaths from this disease had been, only 

 a few years previously, seven hundred and fifty-four. In 

 July 1905 yellow fever broke out among the Italian colony 

 of New Orleans, in the dirtiest and filthiest part of the 

 town ; the disease had become firmly established before it 

 was notified, but, when once the danger was realised, a 

 most thorough and scientific campaign was set on foot. 

 By 12th August the disease was at its height, and in three 

 weeks from the first notification the fever was under 

 control, and " an outbreak which in previous years would 

 have developed into the usual awful epidemic was in a few 

 weeks at a comparatively small cost completely stopped, 

 and that in the face of a dense population, open drains, and 

 a sultry summer." That this statement is no exaggeration 

 is shown by a comparison with a previous yellow fever 

 outbreak in the same city. In 1878, when the population 

 of New Orleans was only 191,418, there were 4,046 deaths, 

 whereas, in 1905, when the population had increased to 

 325,000, the deaths totalled the comparatively small number 



