CO885-(23-24) — Page 490

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

། ། ། ། ། །

Reference:-

CO. 885

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

23 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

52

In St. Vincent the infection is quite similar to that in Grenada, but probably not quite so severe. St. Vincent is a smaller island, and the plan agreed upon for that island is a smaller working plan.

In St. Lucia we find again an infection involving practically all classes of the working population, but an infection which I think is even lighter than it is in St. Vincent Again, we have here a small island, and the working plan as you find in the printed report is small, providing for one Medical Officer supplied with equip- ment and microscopic force to make a beginning with the work.

In Antigua I found that comparatively little scientific work had been done. Dr. Macdonald has done quite a little bit of microscopic work, and is convinced that infection is prevalent over the island, but the amount of work he has done is probably not sufficient to justify us in saying that it is prevalent, and that it is a great econ- omic handicap; and it seemed in view of the situation to be necessary to organize there an investigation first of all, so that the working plan proposed for Antigua is first of all to make an investigation which shall determine two things: first, the prevalence of infection, and in the second place, by a blood test to determine the degree of anæmia it is producing. If this investigation shews in any case that the infection is prevalent, and that it is producing human suffering, and lowered econ- omic efficiency, then we shall organize work for its eradication or control. investigation should indicate that it is inconsiderable or negligible, then the work will end at that point. So that for the seven Colonies which I visited we have agreed upon working programmes for six, and the general outline of that work you will find in the printed Report.

If the

DR. SHIPLEY: I want to know whether you found in these people any necator or ankylostomes.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Both.

DR. SHIPLEY: The coolies who were imported were examined on board ship; Did you find both in those Indian coolies?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: I will not answer that definitely from memory, but my impression is that both were present.

DR. SHIPLEY: Necator used to be thought to be entirely American. MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Yes.

DR. SHIPLEY: I know it is found in Burma and Africa.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: It has been found all round the globe. I think there are some countries in which it has not been found; I do not know that it has ever been discovered in Egypt, but it has been found in countries circling the globe.

SIR HENRY MCCALLUM: As regards the coolie population, is any distinc- tion drawn throughout the Tables of Investigation between Indian coolies who came from Calcutta and those coolies who came from Southern India?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Not in those islands; no distinction has been made. SIR HENRY MCCALLUM: I ask because in my own Colony which I have recently left, Ceylon, the coolies come entirely from Southern India, and we find that practically 90 per cent. of the coolies are infected when they arrive.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: I remember getting a record from the books of one of the big sugar plantations in Trinidad and my recollection is that all those coolies came from Calcutta, and the record was something like this (I am speaking from memory and there may be some inaccuracies): From the first ship, this estate received 25 coolies, and of the 25, 21 were found infected; from the next ship they received 12 and all were found infected; from the next ship they received 12, and 10 were found infected; from the next ship they received 26, and 19 were found infected; and from the last one they received 50, and 42 were found infected. gives you a little idea as to the proportion of infection.

SIR HENRY MCCALLUM: These were all from Calcutta.

That

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: My recollection is that they were all from Calcutta. SIR F. HODGSON: Do you not think there is a good deal that might be done by medical officers on board ship when the coolies are en route from Calcutta to their destination? I do not mean to say in the way of treating for ankylosto- miasis, but in diagnosing them and finding out how many are infected.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: At this distance it would look to be quite easy to diag nose the disease and treat it too, but I remember your experience with that in British Guiana, and they told me in British Guiana they had to give it up. seems to be extremely difficult.

SIR F. HODGSON: To treat, but I meant to diagnose.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: I should think that would be quite possible.

It

53

SIR F. HODGSON: That would assist the medical officers in dealing with the East Indians on their arrival in the Colony.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: I should think it quite possible on this one estate in Trinidad as well to make a miscroscopic examination of all the coolies on their arrival on the estate, and to take those found infected into the hospitals and keep them there until they are cured.

SIR F. HODGSON: That is done, I think, now in British Guiana. MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Yes.

SIR HENRY MCCALLUM: In Ceylon they go a little bit further than that. So high is the percentage of disease in coolies arriving that on their arrival at an estate they usually carry out the principle of Dotheboys Hall and Dr. Squeers, and doctor them all round whether they have got it or not, so that they have a regular It does no harm. You start without a microscopical clearing out at once. examination at all and dose them all, and they do not mind it.

CHAIRMAN: In those Colonies where there are both negroes and Indian coolies have you discovered any difference in the percentage of infection among the black race and among the Indians?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: I think a very marked difference, and it is a difference which corresponds between the two races in the Southern States. There is a more prevalent infection among the whiter races, that is to say amongst our white people in the south, as compared with the blacks, and that holds with all the Indian coolies where I saw the two side by side; it is much more prevalent among the Indian coolies than among the blacks, and with an equal degree of prevalence the white people suffer more than do the blacks.

CHAIRMAN: Could you institute a comparison then, and could you say that

the black is less liable than either the white or Indian coolie?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Beyond all question.

CHAIRMAN: Does that apply also to the case of the mulatto?

mulatto be more susceptible than the pure black?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Our experience in the States indicates that.

Would the

DR. SHIPLEY: Do you not think that is due to the fact that the black man, having been infected for ages, has become more or less immune to it and has become more or less tolerant to the parasite?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: I should not undertake to explain the fact, but I do know that the fact is there.

DR. SHIPLEY: You always do find in parasitised animals that, after having been parasitised for a very long time, they become tolerant to the parasite, and not so infected.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: But we started in the States with this view, that the infection is prevalent among both races, but the white man suffers more than the black man.

We find that is not true. If you take the first time he is examined, our man went through the schools, and examined all the children as he came to them, and he found the percentage of infection in the white schools ran from 71 to 73, and in the black schools at the side of them it ran 19, 22 and 23 per cent.

CHAIRMAN: So that it was not merely that he suffered more, but there was more

present.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Yes, the white man is more subject to the infection itself, and then when he gets the infection he suffers more from it.

CHAIRMAN: And the mulatto suffers more than a pure black.

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: Yes. In this county there were three schools in which the mulatto element was very large, and the infection in those three schools ran into the forties as compared with the others running into the 'teens and twenties.

CHAIRMAN: Are you in a position to make any similar statement about other races, such as the Pacific Islanders, or the Malays?

MR. WICKLIFFE ROSE: No, but I observed the same thing in the West Indies. If you take Barbados, which I mentioned, the Scotland district is a district inhabited largely by white people, and I think I could count on the fingers of one hand all the white persons I saw in that district who did not show all the clinical evidence of the disease. But if you take the blacks living side by side with these white people, they probably have it (I did not use the microscope), but they do not give the same clinical evidence of it. I said to them, "If your investigation shows that you have a situa- tion here which would justify co-operation, I should be very glad to listen to a proposition," but there is such a small district there that it seemed to me that they could very well take care of them.