- Email: [email protected]
Parasites in an empire
DISSECTING ROOM
in the UK and supporting the frustrated Ross in India and with a lead in malaria causation coming from Laveran, a Frenchman, the Haynes theme is much easier to follow. The book ends on even firmer ground. The disputes of a century ago about how tropical doctors should be trained (and where) and about how (and where) tropical medicine research should be done do indeed live on in this non-imperial age. This history is relevant, and Douglas Haynes ends by citing the 1995 BMJ letter and Lancet editorial the following year that ensured that the argument continues. The author, I suspect, is not much in favour of empires. Few Americans are, unless the colonisation be economic. However, perhaps he looks too hard for tension and spin-doctoring when simpler explanations are on offer. Even The Lancet and the BMJ are sometimes perceived as flag-wavers for empire. Possibly, or were their editors just doing their jobs, recording medical discoveries, giving space to controversy, and trying to improve the working conditions of a neglected subgroup of the profession?
Parasites in an empire Imperial Medicine: Patrick Manson and the Conquest of Tropical Disease Douglas M Haynes. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001. Pp 229. $37.50. ISBN 0812235983. niversity of California history teacher Douglas M Haynes sets himself a stiff challenge. In only 180 pages of text (the chapter notes are voluminous) he works the long life of Sir Patrick Manson and the complex vector and parasite biology behind filariasis and malaria into his theme of “British imperialism in the making of Victorian medicine and science”. His prose is littered with that irritating triplet “to be sure” and the theme gets some prolix dressing, such as “a vastly more dynamic dialectical relationship between the imperial metropole and the periphery” and “the very rhetorical accessibility of the empire”—but one gets the point. A clear-cut them/us or home/ away division cannot do justice to the struggles that the Victorian medical and political establishments faced. The desire to ensure both a controlled supply of trained physicians to serve in various “white man’s graves” and an appropriate contribution from
U
British medicine in its broadest sense to the 19th-century revolution in infectious and parasitic disease had to be squared with a variously decentralised colonial administration. Apart from persistently calling Theodor Bilharz “Bilharzia”, Haynes shows a good grasp of parasite and mosquito biology. Too good a grasp, perhaps. 19th-century physicians and scientists were a quarrelsome lot and no century has escaped priority disputes, including ones with nationalistic undertones. Are we asked to interpret the Filaria conflict between T S Cobbold and T R Lewis as tension between complacent “home” (Cobbold) and neglected “away” (Lewis in India), rather than as ordinary scientific disagreement? Haynes gets too bogged down in the biological detail for his argument to be clear. The life-cycles of the malarial parasite and its vector are no less difficult but, with Manson now back
David Sharp c/o The Lancet, London, UK
Close up Balancing act
Hulton Getty Collection
Rights were not granted to include this image in electronic media. Please refer to the printed journal.
1914
Animal testing for medical research has not had a good press in recent years. In the eyes of many activists for animal rights, the use of animals in experiments that can be of direct benefit to mankind is little different from their use in the research and development of consumer products. It is, therefore, pleasing to be able to introduce Harriet, a most feisty hen, elegantly inching her way along a tightrope in the pursuit of science. This surprising image was taken on June 24, 1964, at the Animal Behavior Institute, Hot Springs, USA. Our heroine was taking part in a controlled sequential progression experiment to test animal intelligence. Should we see this as yet another form of animal exploitation or rather as adding to Harriet’s multidisciplinary skills? Colin Jacobson e-mail: [email protected]
THE LANCET • Vol 358 • December 1, 2001
For personal use. Only reproduce with permission from The Lancet Publishing Group.
in the UK and supporting the frustrated Ross in India and with a lead in malaria causation coming from Laveran, a Frenchman, the Haynes theme is much easier to follow. The book ends on even firmer ground. The disputes of a century ago about how tropical doctors should be trained (and where) and about how (and where) tropical medicine research should be done do indeed live on in this non-imperial age. This history is relevant, and Douglas Haynes ends by citing the 1995 BMJ letter and Lancet editorial the following year that ensured that the argument continues. The author, I suspect, is not much in favour of empires. Few Americans are, unless the colonisation be economic. However, perhaps he looks too hard for tension and spin-doctoring when simpler explanations are on offer. Even The Lancet and the BMJ are sometimes perceived as flag-wavers for empire. Possibly, or were their editors just doing their jobs, recording medical discoveries, giving space to controversy, and trying to improve the working conditions of a neglected subgroup of the profession?
Parasites in an empire Imperial Medicine: Patrick Manson and the Conquest of Tropical Disease Douglas M Haynes. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001. Pp 229. $37.50. ISBN 0812235983. niversity of California history teacher Douglas M Haynes sets himself a stiff challenge. In only 180 pages of text (the chapter notes are voluminous) he works the long life of Sir Patrick Manson and the complex vector and parasite biology behind filariasis and malaria into his theme of “British imperialism in the making of Victorian medicine and science”. His prose is littered with that irritating triplet “to be sure” and the theme gets some prolix dressing, such as “a vastly more dynamic dialectical relationship between the imperial metropole and the periphery” and “the very rhetorical accessibility of the empire”—but one gets the point. A clear-cut them/us or home/ away division cannot do justice to the struggles that the Victorian medical and political establishments faced. The desire to ensure both a controlled supply of trained physicians to serve in various “white man’s graves” and an appropriate contribution from
U
British medicine in its broadest sense to the 19th-century revolution in infectious and parasitic disease had to be squared with a variously decentralised colonial administration. Apart from persistently calling Theodor Bilharz “Bilharzia”, Haynes shows a good grasp of parasite and mosquito biology. Too good a grasp, perhaps. 19th-century physicians and scientists were a quarrelsome lot and no century has escaped priority disputes, including ones with nationalistic undertones. Are we asked to interpret the Filaria conflict between T S Cobbold and T R Lewis as tension between complacent “home” (Cobbold) and neglected “away” (Lewis in India), rather than as ordinary scientific disagreement? Haynes gets too bogged down in the biological detail for his argument to be clear. The life-cycles of the malarial parasite and its vector are no less difficult but, with Manson now back
David Sharp c/o The Lancet, London, UK
Close up Balancing act
Hulton Getty Collection
Rights were not granted to include this image in electronic media. Please refer to the printed journal.
1914
Animal testing for medical research has not had a good press in recent years. In the eyes of many activists for animal rights, the use of animals in experiments that can be of direct benefit to mankind is little different from their use in the research and development of consumer products. It is, therefore, pleasing to be able to introduce Harriet, a most feisty hen, elegantly inching her way along a tightrope in the pursuit of science. This surprising image was taken on June 24, 1964, at the Animal Behavior Institute, Hot Springs, USA. Our heroine was taking part in a controlled sequential progression experiment to test animal intelligence. Should we see this as yet another form of animal exploitation or rather as adding to Harriet’s multidisciplinary skills? Colin Jacobson e-mail: [email protected]
THE LANCET • Vol 358 • December 1, 2001
For personal use. Only reproduce with permission from The Lancet Publishing Group.