a handbook of the mosquitoes of north america - Systematic Catalog ...

CHAPTER IV
THE PROBLEM OF MOSQUITO REDUCTION
TYPES OF CONTROL OPERATIONS; NATURAL ENEMIES OF MOS-
QTJITOES ; OTHER METHODS OF MOSQUITO REDUCTION ;
PROTECTION FROM MOSQUITO BITES ; ORGANI-
ZATION FOR CARRYING ON CONTROL WORK
The preceding chapter has indicated briefly the important re-
lations that mosquitoes bear to man. It is strange, that, know-
ing these conditions, man has not made greater efforts to con-
trol them. Only where great outbreaks of diseases have
occurred or where important national developments are under-
taken, or due to devastating sickness in time of war or where
public sentiment has been sufficiently aroused, have peoples
organized great anti-mo,squito campaigns. The results have
been of unprecedented success. Witness the work in Havana,
New Orleans, the Panama Canal Zone, New Jersey, Ishmailia,
Italy, parts of Greece, Palestine, the work at Singapore, etc.
All these campaigns were led by able men supported by govern-
ments and various other agencies and their main object was the
reduction of mosquito-borne disease. Yet despite this, vast
areas of the most fertile regions of the world suffer from
mosquito-borne diseases. Hoffman in 1916 made a plea and
presented a tentative plan for the eradication of malaria
throughout the western hemisphere. This plea is based on the
knowledge “that malaria is perhaps the most important of
human diseases, and though it is not often directly fatal, its
wide prevalence in almost all warm climates produce an enor-
mous amount ol sickness, and mortality.”
The problem of mosquito reduction involves two distinct
points of view; ( 1) that of the public health official who has
been and still is largely concerned with the reduction of mos-
59