A colour atlas of arthropods in clinical medicine

240 A Colour Atlas of Arthropods in Clinical Medicine. W. Peters. London: Wolfe Publishing, 1992. 304~~. Price &90.00. ISBN O-7234-1653-2 Professor Peters belongs to that dwindling breed of medical scientists, physicians who are also excellent and enthusiastic field naturalists and who, undaunted by molecular biology and sophisticated technology, are pointing us towards less expensive and more appropriate technologies for the control of arthropod-borne diseases. This book is ample testimony to his wide ranging knowledge and interests. The atlas is not a text book of medical entomology; there are other books for identifying insects of medical Importance. It deals in a pictorial form with arthropods which cause or transmit diseasesor parasitoses or are responsible for envenomization. There are nearly 1000 excellent photographs, most of them in colour and many of them new. While many are contributed, there are several which are a tribute to Professor Peters’s photographic skills. They show not only what the creatures look like, but illustrate in a very comprehensive manner the pathogenic lesions they cause and the parasites/pathogens they transmit, their habitats, collection methods and control strategies. There are distribution maps, and diagrams to illustrate life cycles, transmission patterns and ecology. A short introduction is followed by brief accounts of the classification, physiology and life cycles of arthropods. The 4 major chapters deal with arthropods as diseasevectors (arboviruses, rickettsioses, bacterial infections, malaria, babesiosesand theilerioses, trypanosomiases, leishmaniases, and helminthiases), ectoparasitic arthropods (insects?ticks and mites, and endoparasitic arthropods includmg pentastomids, scabies and hair follicle mites, myiasis-producing flies and jigger

fleas), and harmful and venomous arthropods. The chapter on harmful and venomous arthropods is the most comprehensive and best illustrated that I have seen. All chapters have tables (32 in all) which list the speciesand their geographical ranges. Each photograph, map or diagram has a short and easily understandable text which gives all the relevant information. The book ends with a short bibliography listing the major literature sourcesfor each chapter and a useful index. Picking out the few errors in this excellent atlas might seemlike ‘nit-picking’, but they in no way detract from the value and usefuln& of the book. The Insecta is a Class. not an Order CD.91. ‘In the ticks and mites the cheliceiae are modified inio piercing stylets’ (p. 15): some mites have stylet-like chelicerae, but other mites and all ticks have toothed chelicerae. The flaviviruses now constitute a separate family, the Flaviviridae (p. 23). Marburg, Ebola and Lassa viruses are not true arboviruses and their inclusion in this group may cause some confusion (Table 7, p. 31). Japanese encephalitis (JE) is the correct name, not Japanese B encephalitis (JBE) (p. 33). R. recurrentis should be B. recurrentis (Table 10, p. 49). The photographs of individual mosquito species do not appear to be particularly useful; for example, a non-entomologist may find it difficult to spot the difference between Aedes afticanus (Fig. 47) and Ae. sinzpsoni (Fig. 48), or between Anopheles stephensi (Fig. 218) and An. balabacensis (Fig. 221), but these are minor criticisms in an otherwise admirable book. At &90, not many individuals will be able to buy this atlas. It deserves a much wider readership and I hope a more reasonably priced paper-back edition will be available soon. M. G. R. Varma