Disease, Tropical
Disease, Tropical.Tropical disease has plagued American forces from the colonial period to modern times. Malaria, dysentery, dengue, and yellow fever (all endemic to the United States), as well as schistosomiasis, yaws, leishmaniasis, filariasis, and scrub typhus (all from other areas), have decimated garrisons and overwhelmed combat troops. To conquer or contain tropical disease, the U.S. military, sometimes cooperating with civilian scientists, developed preventive techniques, therapies, and cures. Collaborative research controlled and even vanquished most tropical diseases except for malaria, whose parasite became immune to traditional antimalarials, and whose prevention and cure remain elusive.
The military historically follows standard civilian practice regarding contagion, diagnosis, and treatment. Before the Civil War, physicians did not suspect mosquitoes as transmitters, blamed fever on the climate or air, and...
[The entire page is 755 words long]
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