Kai’s Reviews > Handbook of Medical Entomology > Status Update

"Hydrocyanic acid gas has been used successfully against household insects and will probably be used more and more in the future." Not my future thankfully!

Cancer is a virus carried by insects according to one scientist in 1909

Loving the casual mentions of uninformed human experimentation. Yes, let's infect unknowing patients with what we think is a lethal disease so we can confirm the transmission route.

"In 1871... The editor of the London Lancet, referring to the belief that they play a useful rôle in purifying the air said, "Far from looking upon them as dipterous angels dancing attendance on Hygeia, regard them rather in the light of winged sponges spreading hither and thither to carry out the foul behests of Contagion.""

Oh the benefits of modern medicine! Things we no longer have to worry about: "When the cyst was punctured, it yielded about two ounces of opalescent fluid containing spermatozoa and numerous mites in all stages of development. The evidence indicated that a fecundated female mite had been introduced into the urethra by means of an unclean catheter."

General advice for dealing with mosquitos and fleas ~100 years ago: COVER EVERYTHING IN GASOLINE! Cat has fleas? SCRUB THE FLOORS OF THE HOUSE WITH GASOLINE WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?

So interesting reading about the old scientific methods: grinding up bugs into a powder, dispersing the powder in water, and injecting it under your skin supposedly told you whether it was venomous or not! So many of the arthropods mentioned are only dangerous in the event of secondary infections, because this was written before antibiotics.