236 THE CARRIAGE OF TYPHOID FEVER BY FLIES 



with typhoid fever at Fernandina, mentioned to him that the lime 

 used about the latrines and garbage dumps was carried by flies to 

 the food which was being used in the camps. 



In the South African War, a year or two later, the same 

 conditions existed, and there was a very heavy loss of life from 

 enteric fever. Writing on the subject, Dunne (1902) says : " The 

 plague of flies which was present during the epidemic of enteric 

 at Bloemfontein in 1900 left a deep impression on my mind, an5, 

 as far as I can ascertain from published reports, on all who had 

 experience on that occasion. Nothing was more noticeable than 

 the fall in the admissions from enteric fever coincident with the 

 killing otF of the flies on the advent of the cold nights of May and 

 June. In July, when I had occasion to visit Bloemfontein, the 

 hospitals there were half empty, and had practically become 

 convalescent camps." 



A similar experience is related by Tooth (1901). Referring to 

 the role of flies he says : " As may be expected, the conditions in 

 these large camps were particularly favourable to the growth and 

 multiplication of flies, which soon became terrible pests. I was 

 told by a resident in Bloemfontein that these insects were by no 

 means a serious plague in ordinary times, but that they came 

 with the army. It would be more correct to say that the normal 

 number of flies was increased owing to the large quantities of 

 refuse upon which they could feed and multiply. They were all 

 over our food, and the roofs of our tents were at times black with 

 them. It is not unreasonable to look upon flies as a very possible 

 agency in the spreading of the disease, not onl\- abroad but at 

 home. It is a well-known fact that with the first appearance of 

 the frost enteric fever almost rapidly disappears.... It seems hardly 

 credible that the almost sudden cessation of an epidemic can be 

 due to the effect of cold upon the enteric bacilli only. But there 

 can be no doubt in the mind of anybody who has been living on 

 the open veldt, as we have for three or four months, that flies are 

 extremely sensitive to the change of temperature, and that the 

 cold nights kill them off rapidly." In the discussion on this paper 

 Church stated that " many nurses told me that if one went into a 

 tent or ward in which the patients were suffering from a variety 

 of diseases, one could tell at once which were the typhoid patients 



