210 Arthropods as Hosts of Pathogenic Protozoa 



In face of a threatened epidennic one of the most essential measures 

 is to educate the citizens and to gain their complete cooperation in 

 the fight along modem lines. This may be done through the schools, 

 the pulpit, places of amusement, newspapers and even bulletin 

 boards. 



Emphasis should be placed on the necessity of both non-immunes 

 and immunes using mosquito curtains, and in all possible ways 

 avoiding exposiu-e to the mosquitoes. 



Then the backbone of the fight must be the anti-mosquito meas- 

 ures. In general, these involve screening and fumigating against 

 adults, and control of water supply, oiling, and drainage against the 

 larvffi. The region involved must be districted and a thorough survey 

 undertaken to locate breeding places, which must, if possible, 

 be eradicated. If they are necessary for water supplies, such as 

 casks, or cisterns, they should be carefully screened to prevent 

 access of egg-laying adults. 



The practical results of anti-mosquito measures in the fight 

 against yellow fever are well illustrated by the classic examples of 

 the work in Havana, immediately following the discoveries of the 

 Army Commission and by the stamping out of the New Orleans 

 epidemic in 1905. 



The opportunities for an immediate practical application of the 

 theories of the Army Commission in Havana were ideal. The city 

 had always been a hotbed of yellow fever and was the principal 

 source from which the disease was introduced year after year into 

 our Southern States. It was under martial law and with a military 

 governor who was himself a physician and thoroughly in sympathy 

 with the views of the Commission, the rigid enforcement of the 

 necessary regulations was possible. The story of the first campaign 

 has been often told, but nowhere more clearly than in Dr. Reed's 

 own account, published in the Journal of Hygiene for 1902. 



Closer home was the demonstration of the efficacy of these 

 measures in controlling the yellow fever outbreak in New Orleans 

 in 1905. During the spring and early summer of the year the disease 

 had, unperceived, gained a firm foothold in that city and when, in 

 early July the local Board of Health took cognizance of its existence, 

 it was estimated that there' had been in the neighborhood of one 

 hundred cases. 



Conditions were not as favorable as they had been under martial 

 law in Havana for carrying on a rigid fight along anti-mosquito lines. 



