Kenneth Mellanby Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) (1908-1993). The facts about scabies.

Kenneth Mellanby was a distinguished biologist specialising in entomology. He helped to establish the first university in Nigeria and undertook pioneering work on the use of insecticides in agriculture. However, he will best be remembered for a series of experiments which he undertook on human volunteers during the Second World War. These experiments established the mechanism of transmission of scabies and allowed its effective control at a time when the condition had reached epidemic proportions, causing a significant adverse effect on public morale and military effectiveness. Mellanby's wartime monograph on scabies remains to this day the definitive work on the disease and is still studied by dermatologists. His subsequent book Human Guinea Pigs is a remarkable account of the privations to which wartime volunteers willingly submitted themselves in a way that would have never passed any current medical ethics committee.

Sarcoptic Mange of Fox Origin in Multiple Farm Animals and Scabies in Humans, Switzerland, 2018.

Fox-derived Sarcoptes scabiei mites caused an outbreak of mange on a farm in Switzerland in 2018. Pruritic skin lesions suggestive of S. scabiei mite infestation developed in 4 humans who had direct contact with affected farm animals but not foxes. Sarcoptic mange is continuously spreading; such outbreaks affecting humans could start occurring more frequently.

On the illness of Politian (Agnolo Ambrogini, 1454-1494): syphilis at its identification in Europe.

The authors investigated the life, the works and the illness of the humanist and poet Agnolo Ambrogini, better known as Politian, and the cause of his death, shedding evidence on the ambiguous meaning of the term scabies that is included in the titles of two works ascribed to Politian, namely 'Sylva in scabiem' and 'De scabie'. These two works tell us the illness that will kill Politian who describes them in detail as a new illness that does appear in other important works dated between the end of the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th. This new illness will be called 'syphilis'. Syphilis was virulent in Europe soon after it appeared and it killed Politian within one year. He seems to have been the first famous European who was not a physician who described his own syphilis. Others include the poet Niccolò Campani (1478-1523), the writer and humanist Ulrich Von Hutten (1488-1523), the sculptor and writer Benvenuto Cellini (1500-1571) and Joseph Grunpeck (1473-1532), and secretary to Emperor Maximilian I (1459-1519). The origins of this serious condition have been ascribed to the crew who accompanied Christopher Columbus (1451-1506).

The scabies problem on active service.

The paper set out by identifying the significant advantage that disease gives to the enemy-plus ca change! Scabies was the commonest skin infection, and uncomplicated cases took 3-4 days to treat, but more complicated cases often resulted in hospitalisation for up to a month. Complicated cases were the norm through, because of the harsh environment that soldiers operated in.

[Textual research of scabies in the Warring States and Qin-Han Dynasties].

Scabies, a kind of skin disease frequently seen in the period of Warring States and Qin-Han Dynasties. By investigating the epidemic condition, disease title, recognition on the disease and the prevention and its treatment through the textual documents, unearthed texts, and dictionaries of this period, it can be seen that "scabies" refers to the itching and corrugation of skin. It was also called "jia" (scar) and belonged to the "dry itching"disease. At that time, people also knew the seasonal, and geographical rules of its incidence and its pathogenic agent, the scabies parasite (sacoptic mite). Treatments included hot compress, rubbing, bathing, and internal medications, mostly inherited in later generations.

Sarna costrosa: reporte de 4 casos / Crusted scabies: 4 cases report

La sarna costrosa o noruega es una enfermedad poco frecuente que se caracteriza por placas hiperqueratosicas, en paciente con comorbilidades que les provocan inmunosupresión. En ellos, el prurito es poco intenso y los parásitos se reproducen ampliamente provocando brotes en la comunidad e intrahospitalarios. En el Hospital Nacional Daniel A. Carrión la frecuencia de sarna costrosa es baja, pero durante 2009, los casos aumentaron de manera alarmante.

Crusted scabies is an uncommon disease characterizated by hyperkeratosis plaquesin a inmunossupresed patient because ofmultiples commorbilities. In patients with is mobilities, pruritus has low intensity and parasitis can reproduce theirselves widely provocating community and hospitalarian outbreaks. In our hospital, the frecuency of crusted scabies is too low, but in 2009, the number of cases has increased in analarmant way. We report 4 cases seen this year in a context of this increasing incidence.

History of diagnostics in dermatovenerology on Medical Faculty in Prague.

The article deals with the history of diagnostics in dermatovenerology on Medical Faculty in Prague from 1875 to 1910. Medical Reports of General Hospital in Prague from those years were used as the source of data. Three dermatologic and venereal diagnoses from years 1875, 1881, 1885, 1890, 1895, 1899, 1906 and 1910 were used for a statistic comparison. The article also contains short description of institutional background of dermatovenerology in Prague during this period.

[About Itching and scabies. Pruritus in medical history--from ancient world to the French revolution]. / Uber Jucken und Krätze. Pruritus im Lauf der Medizingeschichte--von der Antike bis zur Französischen Revolution.

Pruritus (itching) as a disease state and especially as a disease symptom has been object of medical and scientific descriptions and examinations in all epochs since the antiquity and in different cultural periods. Antiquity was dominated by observations and descriptions but during the course of medical history and particularly since the establishment of dermatology, more and more emphasis has been placed on classification and etiologic research.

Perceptions and problems of disease in the one-humped camel in southern Africa in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The one-humped camel (Camelus dromedarius) was first introduced to German South West Africa (Namibia) for military purposes in 1889. Introductions to the Cape of Good Hope (South Africa) in 1897 and Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) in 1903 were initially with a view to replacing oxen that died of rinderpest. Disease risks attendant on these introductions were recognised and to some extent guarded against. There were, however, relatively few problems. One camel was diagnosed as having foot-and-mouth disease. Mange in camels from India caused some concern as did trypanosomosis from Sudan. Trypanosomosis was introduced into both the Cape of Good Hope and Transvaal. Antibodies to some common livestock disease were found in later years.

[Miranda de Ebro: Medical condition of the concentration camp in the autumn of 1943]. / Miranda de Ebro: Etat sanitaire du camp de concentration a l'automne 1943.

Georges Morin's thesis (Algiers January 4 1944) allows to understand the sanitary conditions of the refugee camp at Miranda De Ebro (Spain) in the fall 1943. To avoid the Nazi occupation and the Obligatory Work Service in Germany 18,000 French got in Spain in 1943 and 10,000 including 39 physicians came through Miranda. The French were the majority and they created a Health Service separate from the official Spanish Health Service. The general dirtiness, the lack of water, the rudimentary conditions of lodging, the inadequacy and imbalance of food provoked two diseases among the young men: scabies and the so-called "mirandite" that is to say all the diarrheic diseases in the camp. Despite hard conditions of living the death rate in the camp remained smaller than crossing the Pyrenees from France where the danger threatened the escaped men.

["Norwegian scabies" in a wax model at the Pathology Museum of the University of Florence]. / La scabbia crostosa (norvegese) in una cera appartenente alla collezione del Museo Patologico dell' Università di Firenze.

The reproduction in wax of anatomic specimens is considered a glorious Italian tradition, particularly in Florence. Indeed, the work of wax masters which was cultivated for ex-votos and statuary models, together with the development of anatomic studies under the guidance of Paolo Mascagni at the end of the eighteenth century, gave origin to several collections of waxes, among which the collection of the Museum of Anatomic Pathology holds undoubted interest. The so-called "leper", a full-scale reproduction by Luigi Calamai of a man affected with Norwegian scabies, a rare skin disease, is considered the symbol of the Museum.