Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T22:01:29.545Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Plague in South Africa: a study of the epizootic cycle in gerbils (Tatera brantsi) in the northern Orange Free State

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 May 2009

D. H. S. Davis
D. H. S. Davis
Affiliation:
The Plague Research Laboratory, Union Health Department, Johannesburg
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

1. The course of an epizootic of plague in thirty-four colonies of gerbils (Tatera brantsi) was observed by counting, at 4-weekly intervals, the number of burrows which, when they had been closed on one day, were found open on the next. One gerbil could open an average of eight burrows in one night.

2. Regular censuses on the twenty-one colonies which survived until the last phase of the epizootic showed that the gerbil population fell from about 420 at the end of June 1940 to none at the end of January 1941. From May 1941 to August 1942, 3-monthly counts revealed some recolonization, but field officers reported that between 1942 and 1951 the gerbils sometimes died from plague, and the population never regained its former level.

3. During 1940, two to four colonies died out every 4 weeks. The time of year seemed not to influence the course of the epizootic.

4. Pasteurella pestis was detected in some gerbil colonies 4–6 months before they died out.

5. Plague-infected gerbil fleas were found which had been immured in blocked deserted burrows for periods of up to 120 days.

6. The passage of infection was traced from the reservoir in gerbils to other wild rodents (Otomys irroratus, Rattus (Mastomys) natalensis), to house rats (Rattus rattus) and to man.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Hygiene , Volume 51 , Issue 4 , December 1953 , pp. 427 - 449
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1953

References

Davis, D. H. S. (1939). S. Afr. J. Sci. 36, 438.Google Scholar
Davis, D. H. S. (1948). Proc. 4th int. Congr. trop. Med. Malaria, Wash., 1, 250.Google Scholar
Davis, D. H. S. (1949). Proc. zool. Soc. Lond. 118, 1002.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Meillon, B. (1942). J. ent. Soc. S. Afr. 5, 83.Google Scholar
Devignat, R. (1936). Ann. Soc. belge Méd. trop. 16, 43.Google Scholar
Devignat, R. (1940). Ann. Soc. belge Méd. trop. 20, 41.Google Scholar
Fourie, L. (1936). Proc. Transv. Mine med Offrs' Ass. 15, 43.Google Scholar
Fourie, L. (1938). S. Afr. med. J. p. 351.Google Scholar
Meyer, K. F. (1936). Amer. J. publ. Hlth, 26, 961.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meyer, K. F. (1942). Amer. J. trop. Med. 22, 9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitchell, J. A., Pirie, J. H. H. & Ingram, A. (1927). Publ. S. Afr. Inst. med. Res. 3, 85.Google Scholar
Pirie, J. H. H. (1927). Publ. S. Afr. Inst. med. Res. 3, 138.Google Scholar
Pons, R. (1926). Bull. Soc. Pat. exot. 19, 405.Google Scholar
Union of South Africa (1924). Report of the Department of Public Health for year ended 30 June 1923.Google Scholar
Union of South Africa (1938). Kroonstad Summer Cereal Station, report for the year 1937–8. Pretoria: Government Printer.Google Scholar
Union of South Africa (1943). Report of the Department of Public Health for the year ended 30 June 1943.Google Scholar
Uriarte, L., Morales, Villazon N. & Anchezar, B. (1935). Rev. Inst. bact., B. Aires, 7, 287.Google Scholar
Van Der Merwe, C. R. (1941). Soil groups and subgroups in South Africa, Pretoria. Sci. Bull. Dep. Agric. S. Afr. no. 231.Google Scholar