Report on a preliminary investigation into malaria in the Sigur Ghat, Ootacamund / by Surgeon-Major Ronald Ross.

  • Ross, Ronald, Sir, 1857-1932.
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report on a preliminary investigation into malaria in the Sigur Ghat, Ootacamund / by Surgeon-Major Ronald Ross. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

    9/18 (page 7)
    pounded I feel inclined to admit as a result of my brief investigation that mosquitoes are plentiful enough in the Sigiir Ghat to account, on the supposition of the mosquito being the alternative host of the parasite,for the presence of malaria in that locality. At the same time I must carefully guard myself from being held to mean that I have found more epidemiological evidence for the mosquito-hypothesis than for the other hypothesis already defined. On the contrary, while I admit from my experiences in the ghat that the mosquito theory is possible, I am inclined to think, as a result of these ex- periences alone and apart from Hanson's induc- tions based on the evolution of flagellate bodies, that the hypothesis of the x-protozoon living free in the air, water, soil is just as probable, if not more so, than the mosquito theory. Parasites of mosquitoes in Sigur.—The other question asked in para. 5 and requiring study in the ghat was whether or not the mosquitoes there are afiected with any parasite morphologi- cally similar to the hoeinamoeba malarioe in men. In the intervals between my visits to the ghat, I studied numerous specimens of mos- quitoes, namely, of the silvestris and of insects from Kulhutti and from the disused well at Westbury. The result was that I found no parasite very similar to the hmmaraceha. At the same time, however, several new parasitic forms were noted, as well as two forms suspected to be parasitic, and I think it will be useful to describe these briefly in view of the possibility that the hcemamoeba is dimorphic—in other words that the x-protozoon in the mosquito (if it live there at all) is not morphologically similar to the hcBmamceba—a possibility which will be discussed presently. The following is a com-