Studies in Relation to Malaria

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Abstract
The importance of malaria as a disease affecting vast numbers of the human race renders it essential that we should study most completely all that affects the etiology of the disease. Through the brilliant researches of Ross, Grassi, Bignami and Bastianelli, and others we know that several species of Anopheles serve as definitive hosts of human malarial parasites, and that when these insects are infected they are capable of communicating the parasite to man. As far as the evidence goes these insects appear to be the only means by which the disease is spread. The sexually mature parasites circulating in man's blood gain access to the insect when it feeds upon this fluid. After a period of 7 to 8 days, under suitable conditions of temperature, the parasites appear in the insect's saliva, and when this occurs the latter is capable of producing infection by the act of biting. The highly interesting literature on this subject has been considered elsewhere by one of us, as also by Lühe, and the reader is referred to these publications for particulars1.