Science and Empire: East Coast Fever in Rhodesia and the Transvaal

Front Cover
Cambridge University Press, Aug 22, 2002 - Medical - 404 pages
East Coast fever is a lethal disease of cattle caused by a parasite. It affects and distorts lymph cells and causes them to behave like cells in leukemia and lymphoma. The disease was unknown to Western science or to veterinary practice until it was introduced into Rhodesia in 1901. It devastated the cattle-raising and ox-cart dependent transport systems of Rhodesia and South Africa and was not fully brought under control for some fifty years. It remains a serious problem in East and Central Africa. The book describes the social and economic impact of the outbreak, the scientific investigations into it, and the effort to control it. The scientific study of the disease was done in part by the famous bacteriologist, Robert Koch, whose many early errors retarded later investigations, which were far more sound. Much of the text is accessible to the nonspecialist reader and one chapter deals with the present-day understanding of the basic nature of the disease.
 

Contents

The places and the players
7
A new disease?
22
The search for an expert
52
Robert Koch in Bulawayo
87
Joseph Chamberlain
121
Arnold Theiler Charles Lounsbury and Duncan Hutcheon
137
The fight against East Coast fever
181
The Africanowned cattle in Rhodesia
223
Two more parasites and another new disease
239
What is East Coast fever?
258
Epilogue
277
Notes and references
290
Index
375
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