536 THE ANIMAL PARASITES OF MAN 



Cimex rotundatus, Signoret, 1852. 



[This bug is common in warm climates; it is an abundant insect 

 in India, and King has found it in the Sudan, where C. lectultirhis is, 

 however, the common species. It is usually known as the tropical 

 bed bug. Signoret's bug can be told from the other common species 

 by the shape of the pronotum. In C. rotundatus it is uniformly 

 convex, whilst in C. lectnlarins the lateral edges are flat and sometimes 

 even concave. The abdomen of rotundatus is also rather more 

 elongate. 



[This species is of considerable importance, as according to Patton 

 it may act partly as the intermediary host of the piroplasma of 

 kala-azar. 



[Wenyon found at Bagdad that Cimex sp. would take up Leishmania 

 from Oriental sore, and that the parasite developed into flagellate 

 form. Patton came to the conclusion that the bed bug transmitted 

 Oriental sore in Cambay, India, but Wenyon contests this view 

 (vide Jonrn. Loud. School Trop. Med., 1912, ii, pt. i, pp. 13-26). 

 Franchini (Bull. Soc. Path, exot., 1912, v, No. 10, pp. 817-819) 

 was unable to connect Cimex with this disease. At present nothing 

 seems proved. Besides their possible connection with kala-azar, it 

 has been shown by Howard and Clark (Journ. Exp. Med., 1912, xvi, 

 No. 6, pp. 850-859) that they can carry the virus of poliomyelitis. 



[This bed bug was originally described from the Island of Reunion 

 in 1852 by Signoret. A similar insect was described from Burma by 

 Fieber, in 1861, as C. macrocephalns. This is the same as Signoret's 

 species. 



[The distribution given by Patton 1 is as follows : India, Burma, 

 Assam, Malay, Aden, Islands of Mauritius and Reunion. Patton in 

 this paper refers to an erroneous statement made in a recent edition 

 of this book (the last English edition). As I have personally kept 

 lectulariiis in moist dirt, wood and refuse for over two years, the 

 statement as far as I am concerned is not erroneous. Moreover, since 

 his doubting this fact the same experiment has been twice repeated 

 with the same results. What they did and do persist on I cannot 

 say. F. V. T.] 



Cimex columbarius, Jenyns. 



[This is common in parts of Europe in pigeon nests, and also 

 amongst poultry (vide Report Econ. Zool. for year ending 

 September 30, 1913, pp. 142-144, Theobald). It occurs in Britain on 

 the latter and will attack man. I have personally been badly bitten 

 whilst collecting them. It is rounder and has shorter antennae than 



1 Indian Med. Gaz., February, 1907, xlii, No. 2. 



