Scabies

Definition and stakes

Hints to Travellers, Scientific and General…

“ It will not kill a full-grown bug under an hour, but it is extraordinarily effective with fleas. It is important to obtain a good pyrethrum powder, as such preparations are frequently adulterated.
The Itch Insect is the cause of the skin disease known as scabies. It is a mite, the female of which burrows under the skin to lay her eggs. The favourite site for her operations is between the fingers, but other parts of the body may be affected, and the rash produced may assume various forms, so that it is well in the case of any skin eruption in the tropics to remember the possibility of scabies.
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Source: Gutenberg

O. A. Johannsen,  Handbook of Medical Entomology

“ This disease is very contagious, and is much more resistant than the ordinary scabies. Unlike the latter, it may occur on the face and scalp.
Sarcoptes scabiei not only attacks man but also occurs on a large number of mammals. Many species, based on choice of host, and minute differences in size and secondary characters, have been established, but most students of the subject relegate these to varietal rank. Many of them readily attack man, but they have become sufficiently adapted to their normal host so that they are usually less persistent on man.
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Source: Gutenberg

E. R. Stitt,  The diagnostics and treatment of tropical diseases (1922)

“ In this connection, excoriations of the skin resulting from the scratching of scabies-infested areas makes a scabies patient [462] peculiarly liable to trench fever infection. The louse faeces become infective only after seven days from the time of feeding on trench fever cases, this fact indicating a developmental cycle in the louse.
Pathology
As the disease of itself is never fatal, there have been no opportunities for studying the pathological changes.
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Source: Gutenberg

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