Yellow Fever Panama

About Yellow Fever Panama

Yellow fever and malaria devastated both French and American canal construction efforts in Panama. The French effort led by Ferdinand de Lesseps from 1881 to 1889 lost approximately 22,000 workers to disease. The American effort beginning in 1904 initially suffered similar losses. Chief Sanitary Officer William C Gorgas implemented aggressive mosquito control after Walter Reed had proven mosquito transmission of yellow fever in 1900. His campaign relied on screening, drainage, oiling of breeding sites, and fumigation, along with eliminating standing water and isolating the sick. Yellow fever was eliminated from the Canal Zone by 1906. Malaria rates dropped dramatically. The success of Gorgass campaign enabled completion of the Panama Canal in 1914. Without mosquito control, the canal could not have been built. Gorgas later advised sanitation programs in other tropical countries. The Panama campaign demonstrated that vector control could conquer diseases that had blocked tropical development for centuries.