The Biology of Mosquito-Borne Disease

"Mosquitoes do not surrender to elephants," says Walter Lippman. In this book, P. F. Mattingly discusses some of the secrets that enable mosquitoes to be so courageous. The book is a comprehensive discussion of the natural history of mosquito-borne diseases and the mosquitoes which carry them. It primarily deals with current ecological concepts and succeeds in conveying a wealth of information about mosquito biology and the epidemiology of vector-borne disease. This information gains historical perspective by the inclusion of numerous references to early discoveries in tropical medicine and medical entomology. This is particularly noticeable in the Introduction, which is a capsule history of the importance of medical entomology from its origin in 1877 to the present. The book is organized in a logical sequence, commencing with a general discussion of the ecology of vector-borne disease, proceeding through more specific biological information about the life histories, genetics and distribution of mosquitoes and concluding with a summary of some of the major achievements in the control of mosquito-borne disease. The final chapter emphasizes the need for extensive research before our understanding of the intricacies of mosquito biology and disease ecology will enable us to assume ultimate control of mosquito-borne disease. The book is profusely illustrated with helpful diagrams and line drawings, as well as twelve photographic plates. The latter depict several unusual scenes in the laboratory and tropical forest which will aid the uninitiated reader in understanding the difficulties of research in mosquito ecology and the peculiarities in the life histories of these insects. There are references after each chapter which are useful for identifying the primary sources of information presented in the preceding chapter. There is also a short bibliography at the end of the book that is primarily limited to papers on the ecology of adult mosquitoes. The book suffers from several typographical errors and the sentence structure in a few places is ungrammatical to the point of incomprehensibility; however, the comprehensive and fact-filled nature of this little book more than compensates for these relatively minor problems. The Biology of Mosquito-Borne Disease should be particularly useful to entomologists and epidemiologists concerned with the control of vectors of disease. In addition, students of medical entomology and tropical medicine and the history of these disciplines should find it very enjoyable reading. The book is the first in "The Science of Biology Series," which promises to be extremely educational if the first volume is an example of things to come.