PREFACE 



In this short history of the Yellow Fever Campaign in New Orleans 

 in 1905, I have given an account of the measures which the inhabi- 

 tants of that City adopted to stamp out the fever. I have made full 

 use of the numerous documents with which I was freely furnished, and 

 I reproduce very many of them with little comment of my own. The 

 evidence shews in a very clear and simple manner how a large city 

 of 330,000 inhabitants, suddenly realising that it was face to face 

 with a serious outbreak, determined without hesitation to put into 

 force the most recent prophylactic measures, to rigidly exclude all the 

 older methods and theories, and to proceed at once to the complete 

 extermination of the Yellow Fever mosquito. In adopting this plan 

 of campaign there was never any hesitation or misgiving, the neces- 

 sary funds were at once forthcoming, and all classes of the community 

 heartily joined with the medical authorities in the attack. From 

 beginning to end it was a determined effort to rid the City of the 

 Stegomyia pest, and to remove once for all the reproach from the 

 Fort of New Orleans that it harboured the mosquito by means of 

 which the disease alone could be propagated. The efforts were 

 completely successful, and shew what can be done by a community, 

 without recourse to force, in a mixed population and labouring under 

 many other disadvantages. 



The example of New Orleans, as well as of that of the successful 

 campaign at Havana in igoo, and of the great improvements which 

 have been brought about at Vera Cruz, Rio and other places, should 

 stimulate all nations in the Yellow Fever zone to undertake the 

 extermination of the Stegomyia fasciata. Considering the com- 

 parative simplicity and inexpensiveness of the methods necessary to 

 be employed, the only excuse for the presence of Yellow Fever in 

 any district must now be attributed to indifference. The practi- 

 cability of the systematic extermination of the Stegomyia will also, 

 in my opinion, pave the way to a far more determined and scientific 

 effort to get rid of the Malaria-bearing Anopheles, towards which, 

 unfortunately, a large section of mankind seem to have grown 

 tolerant and apathetic, although it is now well known to be the 

 greatest cause of the hindrance to progress in the tropics 



