THE RELAPSING FEVERS OF ASIA 



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THE RELAPSING FEVERS OF ASIA. 



There are probably a number of relapsing fevers in Asia, but we 

 only know two which have lice as carriers, and these are: — 



1. The Indian relapsing fever. 



2. The Manchurian relapsing fever. 



The Relapsing Fever of India. 



Definition, — An acute specific relapsing fever caused by Spiro- 

 schaudinnia carteri Manson, 1907, and spread by the louse in all 

 probability. 



History. — Relapsing fever is one of the endemic diseases of India, 

 being traceable back into the eighteenth century. The credit of 

 first clearly defining the disease, however, rests with Lyall in the 

 epidemic fever in the Punjaub in 1852-53; but Vandyke Carter, 

 in 1876-77, in the Bombay Presidency found spirochsetes in the 

 blood of patients suffering from fever, and his work on the subject, 

 published in 1882, is to be regarded as the Indian classic on this 

 fever. Schellach, in 1907, separated this spirochaste from S. re~ 

 currentis and 5. novyi by finding that it is not agglutinated by the 

 serum of animals infected with these parasites. Rogers points out 

 that the disease has often been confounded with typhus fever in 

 India. In 1911 Stott suggested that two varieties of fever may 

 be included under this term, and recent research shows that 

 several varieties of relapsing fever probably exist in India. 

 Types of relapsing fever, which rnay possibly be different from 

 the Indian ones, occur in China and French Indo-China, while 

 the Arabian type may be identical with the West African relapsing 

 fever. 



Climatology. — ^The real home of the disease appears to be the 

 Bombay Presidency, but it is also known in the Punjaub and in the 

 Kumaon Hills of the North-Western Provinces. 



etiology. — The cause of the disease is the spirochsete found by 

 Vandyke Carter in 1877. It is inoculable into man, as was proved 

 by Carter inoculating himself twice, with an interval of two and a 

 quarter years. It can also be inoculated into monkeys, but not into 

 rats and mice. Bugs are capable of retaining it alive in their 

 alimentary canals for from four to seven days when obtained from 

 monkeys, but do not appear to be so effective in obtaining it from 

 man, as only one in fifty-three were found infected after feeding on 

 human beings. Infected bugs are capable of transmitting the 

 disease to monkeys. Rogers, however, thinks that mosquitoes 

 may be found to be more effective than bugs. Mackie has brought 

 forward evidence in favour of Pediculus corporis being a carrier. 

 (For description of the spirochaete, see p. 446.) 



S. carteri is separated from 5. duftoni by the latter being far more 

 easily inoculable into animals and producing numerous relapses 



