The Great Fever (2006)

The Great Fever is a documentary film which premiered on US television (PBS) in 2006. It is an episode in the long-running series American Experience. Here is some basic information about it:

** Written and produced by Adriana Bosch
** Directed by Adriana Bosch and Michael Chin

** Narrated by Linda Hunt

** Run time: 52 minutes

This is the story of the yellow fever, which had terrorized the United States for more than two hundred years, killing an estimated 100,000 people in the 19th century alone. For a long time, nobody knew the origin of the disease and therefore there was no way to prevent it. But around the year 1900, things began to change.

This film explains how the origin of the disease was discovered, how scientists found a way to prevent it and how it was eventually eradicated in the US. It is a fascinating story of a scientific discovery, a medical break-through.

Five witnesses were interviewed for the film. Here are the names in alphabetical order:

** Margaret Humphreys, medical historian
** Paul Jurgensen, specialist, infectious diseases

** John R. Pierce, US Army Medical Corps

** John Tone, historian

** Jim Writer, author

A DEADLY DISEASE

Yellow fever, aka Yellow Jack, would usually strike during the summer, but not every summer. At first, it was a problem in the south, but when people from the south travelled to the north, it became a national problem.

Here is a list of major outbreaks that occurred between 1793 and 1905

# 1. 1793 – Philadelphia – 5,000 dead
# 2. 1795 – New York City – almost 1,000 dead

# 3. 1798 – Boston, New York & Philadelphia – more than 5,000 dead

# 4. 1800 – Baltimore – more than 1,000 dead

# 5. 1853 – New Orleans – 8,000 dead

# 6. 1855 – Norfolk – 2,000 dead

# 7. 1878 - Mississippi Valley – 20,000 dead

# 8. 1898 – Cuba – more than 2,000 US soldiers dead

# 9. 1905 – New Orleans – 452 dead

The discovery of the origin of the disease and the systematic campaign against it, must be credited to four persons who are portrayed in the film:

** Carlos Finley (1833-1915) was a scientist who lived in Cuba, where the disease was prevalent. He devoted many years of his life to study the disease, focusing on its origin. He had this argument: if you know where it comes from, it will be so much easier to prevent it. He was right, of course.

In 1881, at a medical conference in Havana, he presented his theory that yellow fever was caused by an agent – a mosquito – which infected a healthy person. At that point he did not have any proof. It was basically a theory. He was met with silence. There were no objections, no questions, just silence. He was regarded as a mad scientist. For many years nobody would listen to him.

** Jesse Lazear (1866-1900) was a member of a medical team that was sent to Cuba in the year 1900 in order to study yellow fever. Two years before, the US had declared war on Spain and US troops had been sent to Cuba. The US troops had defeated the Spanish army in a matter of months. Less than 400 US soldiers were killed by Spanish bullets, but more than 2,000 US soldiers were killed by yellow fever. This was not acceptable. Something had to be done.

While the leader of the team went back to the US, Lazear continued his studies. He believed Finley had been right when he suspected the mosquito was the agent that caused the disease and he made some experiments to prove it. As guinea pigs he used another member of the team and a US soldier. He also used himself.

The team member and the soldier got the disease, they suffered for a while and then they recovered. Lazear himself was not so lucky. When he got the disease, it killed him. But his sacrifice was not in vain. He had proved Finley right, and once the origin of the disease was known, it was possible to find a way to prevent it.

** Walter Reed (1851-1902) was the leader of the medical team in Cuba. At first he had been sceptical of Finley’s theory. But they had tried everything else, and nothing had worked. Perhaps he was right. They went to see Finley and hear what he had to say. For almost 20 years, Finley had been waiting for someone to take him seriously. Now his moment had finally arrived.

When Reed returned to Cuba and realised that Finley had been proven right by Lazear’s experiments, he initiated a controlled scientific experiment of his own. Armed with the results of this experiment, he could prove once and for all that the mosquito was indeed the agent that caused the disease.

Unfortunately, Reed did not live very long after this medical triumph. He died in 1902 as a result of a ruptured appendix.

** William Crawford Congas (1854-1920) served as sanitation chief in Cuba during the US occupation of the island. Once the origin of the disease was known, he organized a campaign against it. Victims were placed in a safe area where no mosquitos could get to them. People who were not infected were told to sleep under a mosquito net. Standing water was a breeding ground for mosquitos. Therefore all water tanks were sealed. In addition, a systematic campaign of fumigation was conducted. It worked!

In 1904, Congas was assigned to the Panama Canal Zone where yellow fever was a huge problem. Using the same methods as he had used in Cuba he was able to keep the workers healthy, and the Panama Canal was completed ten years later, in 1914. Without this knowledge, and without this campaign, it would have been impossible to complete this project.

[American Experience has devoted an episode to the construction of the Panama Canal: season 23 episode 06: “The Panama Canal” (2011).]

In 1905, Yellow Jack returned to New Orleans. A medical team went into action. At first, many citizens were sceptical; they did not want to obey the instructions that were given. But there was no way around it. The campaign went ahead and it worked.

By the end of the year, the outbreak had come to an end and the total number of dead was 452. Under previous conditions, the disease would have spread and demanded thousands of lives. This time it was contained and the damage was successfully limited to less than five hundred victims.

The 1905 outbreak in New Orleans was the last case of yellow fever in the US. Today there are occasional outbreaks in Latin America and serious epidemics in West and Central Africa. In spite of a century of research, there is still no cure against it.

POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE

This film is composed of four elements.

# 1. Interviews with witnesses.
# 2. Old photos in black-and-white.

# 3. Colour drawings of certain scenes.

# 4. Re-enactment of certain scenes.

The combination of these elements gives a good variation.

This is an excellent film. The witnesses are well-chosen. The film is easy to understand. It is never too technical. The producers have done a good job. They show us the tragic consequences of the disease. What I like best is that they show us the process of scientific discovery, the medical break-through, which led to the victory over the dreaded disease (at least in the US).

It is easy to say something positive about the film. As for the negative side, I do not have much to say. In fact, I have only one minor quibble: talking about Lazear’s experiments in Cuba, and his ambitions as a medical scientist, Jim Writer says: “the potential for a Nobel Prize may not be out of line.”

I think this statement is an anachronism. The Nobel Prize was established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895. But in the year 1900, no scholar had ever received the prize. The first Nobel Prizes were awarded in 1901. Did Lazear know about the coming system of Nobel Prizes, as he was working on his experiments in Cuba in the year 1900? I do not think so. I am afraid Jim Writer is getting ahead of himself with this remark.

CONCLUSION

This film is highly recommended. It covers an important topic and does so very well. If you are interested in the history of the modern world, in particular the history of medical science, this film is definitely something for you.

PS # 1. For more information, see the following books (two of them are written by witnesses in the film):

** Yellow Fever and the South by Margaret Humphreys (1992, 1999)

** Yellow Jack by John R. Pierce & Jim Writer (2005)

** Yellow Fever by James L. Dickerson (2006)

PS # 2. American Experience is a television program produced by PBS. The first episode was aired in 1988. The number of episodes differs from one season to the next, but the program is still running today. The topic under review here (yellow fever) is season 19 episode 6 from 2006. There is more information about the topic on the PBS website about this episode.

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