186 THE YELLOW FEVER CAMPAIGNS 



THE ANTI- YELLOW FEVER CAMPAIGN IN RIO 

 JANEIRO AND SANTOS, 1903 



In a very delightful tract entitled " Comment on 

 assainit im Pays " ^ — or the extinction of yellow fever 

 in Rio — will be found the results obtained to-day by 

 the vigorous war against the stegomyia which has 

 been waged since 1903. 



Brazil has usually been regarded as the home of 

 yellow fever. We have already seen how, in the 

 remarkable wanderings of the ship Oriflcnnme, bound 

 from Siam to the Antilles, there was an account 

 of lier putting into some port in Brazil, and how 

 from that fact we concluded that the so-called 

 " maladie de Siam " should be more appropriately 

 called " maladie de Bresil." On the other hand, 

 those of Brazil blame the ^Vntilles for the introduction 

 of the disease in the seventeenth century. But, 

 however that may be, fresh doses of the infection 

 came at successive intervals as trade grew. Great 

 epidemics resulted in consequence. Thus we read 

 of great outbreaks in 1850, 1851, 1852. In 1899 

 the mortality from the disease was 35,557. This 

 great death rate was just at the time when Brazil 

 was expanding, just wlien large numbers of young 

 men, labourers and clerks, had been attracted from 

 the Old World to the new country — " conquistadores " 

 of commerce — it was amongst the new-comers that 

 the mortality was so high, just as of yore. It also 

 became evident about the year 1883 that yellow 



' By Raugel Pestana. 



