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places similar forms of fever were very prevalent. In i 9°3 the Medical Officer 
also referred to the introduction of a highly malignant remittent fever brought 
from Corosal and places on the Mexican side of the Rio Hondo. 
In 1905 the Medical Officer for the Orange Walk District in the north of 
the Colony, states in his Report for 1904, that Malaria was unusually prevalent, 
being "quite epidemic in July and August.” The type was mild, but there was 
one fatal case of Black water. 1 he number of deaths registered was 88, of a 
total of 170; there were also 17 deaths ascribed to convulsions, some 01 which 
were, the Medical Officer thinks, due to Malaria. In both Corosal and Orange 
Walk the rainfall was excessive in 1904. 
The increase in the severity of Malaria in British Honduras and (apparently 
from report) in surrounding Republics in I 9 Q 4 > ma y point to the presence 
of general conditions favourable to malarial propagation, namely, railway and 
other works necessitating the transference and congregation of large bodies of 
workmen and meteorological conditions favourable to the development of the 
Anopheles. In the adjoining portions of the Republic of Mexico and 
Guatemala large bodies of men have been massed and moved for various 
industrial enterprises in 1904, and many of the labourers came from Belize 
and Districts; but it would be difficult to say whether in 1904 meteorological 
conditions were more suitable than in other years or not. It is known that 
in some districts the rainfall was very high, in others it appeared normal, 
and there are no reports from many districts. In countries liable to Yellow 
fever a sharp look-out should be kept for any increase in number and 
severity of Malaria cases, especially where railway or other great industrial 
works are in progress, for it is quite possible that cases of Yellow fever may 
be mistaken for pernicious forms of Malaria. In this connection it is of 
interest to observe that the series of epidemics of Yellow fever in Belize, 
which commenced in 1886, were preceded by a very large increase of 
malarial cases, as shown by the Hospital return of 1885, and I further note 
that the Medical Officer in his report of the 1890 epidemic states, that "at 
the end of 1889 exceptional floods were followed by an unusually severe 
outbreak of malarial fevers.” We have now evidence which shows that some 
of them might have been cases of Yellow fever. 
Conditions which favour the development of Anopheles in Belize and other 
towns in British Honduras. — In Belize and Corosal the houses are surrounded 
by swamp on the land side, and the ground is only a few inches above sea level 
in many places. Water finds its way slowly from the swamps or higher land at 
the back by means of the grass grown gutters along the streets, or rain water 
collects in the shallow pools and drains in compounds and roadways ; in either 
case the Anopheles is given favourable opportunities of breeding. In Plan III. 
of the Anopheles breeding places in Belize it will be seen that the distribution is 
very wide spread. The larvae are most abundant in the grass plots at the 
north and south ends of the town, namely, at the Barracks, Freetown and 
Yarborough. In these places there are numerous shallow weed-grown ponds 
and ditches containing clear water, and to a certain extent free from the 
innumerable fish present in the swamp. Along many of the streets there are 
shallow weed-grown drains, which it is true are often flushed by the heavy 
rains and the inundations from high tides, but the weeds no doubt act as 
