PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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18 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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The facts as at present ascertained; are that the Baluba district is heavily infected and that several imported cases have appeared at Ruwe and Kambove. On the other hand, the cases formerly recorded on the Luapula and Lake Mweru have died out without, it is believed, establishing any focus of infection, and in this respect the situation, as far as the threatened infection of the Luapula Valley is concerned, is much improved. All ferries across the Luapula have been closed, except the ferry at Madona, which is open to Rhodesian natives returning from Katanga, who are examined by our medical officer, and a ferry much further south and far removed from any contact with Katanga or any endemic area across which North-Eastern Rhodesia natives pass freely to and from the railway and mines in North-Western Rhodesia.
I am of opinion that the closing of the ferries and the order prohibiting the movement of our natives to and from the Congo will be generally respected, but there is sure to be a certain amount of evasion, probably quite enough to defeat our purpose. To assist our officers in enforcing this order I have drafted and submitted to the Commissioner a regulation making disobedience punishable with fine and imprisonment.
I regret to have to report that Dr. Noble, who has been especially employed on the Luapula for the past year, has not proved himself equal to the duties required of him, partly owing to indifferent health and partly to lack of any keen interest in the work. His health has of late been very unsatisfactory and he has now been definitely invalided and replaced at the Madona Inspection Post by Dr. Farndale, district surgeon, from Abercorn.
Referring to the correspondence forwarded with your letter of 1st March,- the London and Liverpool Schools of Tropical Medicine appear to take an unneces- sarily pessimistic view of the position, and much of their advice and of their sug- gestions are quite impracticable. (As an example of unjustified alarm may be quoted the assertion by Dr. Todd in May, 1906, that the invasion of Nyasaland was imminent, whereas up to the present the disease has not been discovered within 300 miles of it, and as an example of impracticable advice Dr. Kinghorn's sugges- tion that it should be made a penal offence to employ a native with enlarged glands). It is almost certain that in course of time imported cases of sleeping sickness will discover themselves in this territory, but should this happen, even to the extent of some hundreds of cases, there would be little difficulty in removing them from fly areas and allowing them to die out without establishing an endemic area unless it is proved that other flies and biting insects as well carry the disease, in which case the difficulty would be greater but not insuperable.
In the report by Dr. Hodges, Medical Officer of the Uganda Protectorate, published by the Royal Society in February last, the conditions necessary for the occurrence of a great epidemic are plainly stated as follows:-
Ci
"(1) The presence of Glossina palpalis in large numbers over a considerable
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area.
(2) A thickly gathered numerous population.
(3) Free and frequent inter-communication, much of it within the fly-
range.
"(4) A considerable part of the population either living or daily employed
within the fly-range.
"
(5) A coast or banks much broken by inlets, estuaries, and rivers, and with
adjacent islands.
These conditions may be summed up as the constant infection and re-infection of large numbers of flies and the exposure to them of large numbers of people." (Reports of the Sleeping Sickness Commission of the Royal Society, No. VIII, February, 1907, page 93.)
Glossina palpalis may, of course, exist, but careful search has never yet discovered it in North-Eastern Rhodesia, although it has been found on the Congo side of the Luapula and quite close on the Congo side of our northern boundary at Mpweto and Mweru. It is not likely that on closer examination it will be found "in large numbers over a considerable area.' A thickly gathered numerous → population living or daily employed within the fly-range" with "free and frequent intercommunication" is nowhere to be found in this country, and the geographical conditions described by Dr. Hodges are found in very few localities.
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It seems, therefore, that the pessimistic views of the Tropical School are hardly
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justified by facts,so far as they are known, and that until the danger approaches a little closer, we have little to do but watch events and guard our border more or less on the lines suggested in my memorandum of 2nd February. To carry this out effectively no less than three medical officers must be employed, and as matters stand at present, owing to Dr. Noble's retirement, we have only one.
When Dr. Kinghorn arrives in this country and finds how matters really stand I expect he will lose no time in getting on to the Luapula, and, if he wishes to see cases of sleeping sickness, to Katanga, and we shall have the benefit of his advice, which will then be more useful. I am also making arrangements for our own Principal Medical Officer, Dr. Spillane, to visit the Luapula this year, as I think we should not accept the views and recommendations of the representatives of the Tropical Schools until we have given due consideration to the opinion of men who have knowledge and experience of local conditions and can advise as to the practical usefulness of any precautionary or preventive measures proposed.
I hope soon to hear more from Dr. Sheffield Neave as to the progress of events in Katanga, and have asked him for an expression of his opinion as to danger to which this country is exposed, and for his advice as regards preventive and pre- cautionary measures.
With regard to the correspondence forwarded under cover of your letter No. A. 148 of 23rd March, I understand that the rumours of imported cases of sleeping sickness at Ndola and Mwomboshi were not confirmed, and were only based on statements made by an unqualified medical practitioner and the yet less con- vincing statements of the Native Commissioners. It seems a pity that undue weight was attached to those vague reports, which are certain to bias medical opinion, and may affect the labour supply at the Bwana Mkubwa and Broken Hill mines unless entirely disproved, and that is hardly possible now.
It is quite evident that if sleeping sickness invades Northern Rhodesia the country will be set back for many years and the progress of the whole of Rhodesia will be affected, and it is therefore most important that no precautions should be neglected and every suspicious circumstance should be thoroughly investigated. On the other hand, it will be almost as bad if we take an exaggerated view of the danger and allow all local progress to be impeded by unnecessary prohibitions.
I am, &c., The Secretary,
ROBERT CODRINGTON.
The British South Africa Company,
2, London Wall Buildings, London, E.C.
TANGANYIKA CONCESSIONS, LIMITED. KATANGA MEDICAL COMMISSION.
DEAR SIR,
Kambove, March 1, 1907. I HAVE received a request from home-being the Principal Officer of the Commission to send you particulars of sleeping sickness as it affects the labour employed by the Tanganyika Concessions and now by the Union Minier Company.
You have already received Dr. Massey's report, which shows we have had cases at Ruwe among boys coming from Kabinda. Since then we have, in addition, had cases here at Kambove:-
(1) In eleven boys (including a native of Matanda, North-East Rhodesia, now at Mazangulu) who have been in the Baluba district for a long time, which was shown by Dr. Massey to be infected on his map.
(2) In three cases from the district at the junction of the Dikulwe and Lufira rivers, where it is asserted that Dr. Archenso, of the Congo Government, found palpalis in 1905. (But this is not stated in the map given me in November, 1906, at Brussels, as the authentic record of places where it has been found.)
In one native of Kayumba, close to the junction of the Lufira and
Lualaba.
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(3)
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(4) In one native of Mwepo, who had been twice to Mazanguli, with one
and a half miles of which palpalis is known to exist.
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(5)
In three natives of Kiambi (about 220 miles up the Luapula from
Ancoro).
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Thus of our own knowledge the portion of the Lualaba mentioned in Dr:
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