Carlos Finlay

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The importance of Carlos Finlay (1833–1915) in the discovery of the mosquito vector of yellow fever has often been overshadowed by the fame of his American colleague and friend, Walter Reed. A Cuban physician of Scottish ancestry, Finlay trained in France and at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. In 1881, he published his theory that a microbial agent transmitted from person to person by mosquito bites was the cause of yellow fever. Isolated in his views for the rest of the century, Finlay performed careful mosquito breeding experiments and identified the correct yellow fever vector, Aedes aegypti (then called Stegomyia fasciata or Culex fasciatus). However, he failed to produce experimental yellow fever in human volunteers by exposing them to mosquitoes fed on yellow fever patients, possibly because he did not recognize the long incubation period of the yellow fever agent inside the mosquito.

Finlay was also one of several nineteenth-century bacteriologists who mistakenly believed that they had isolated a specific microbial cause of yellow fever (shown, in the 1930s by Max Theiler, to be a virus), but Finlay's tetragenus, like Guiseppe Sanarelli's Bacillus Icteroides and Domingo Freire's micrococcus, proved to be a harmless contaminant. The experimental proof of the mosquito transmission pathway was obtained in Walter Reed's experiments with U.S. Army volunteers near Havana in the summer of 1900. Finlay supplied the eggs from which the mosquitoes used in the experiments were hatched, and Reed was careful to credit the importance of Finlay's work in each of his publications describing his experiments. Finlay served as president of the Cuban Board of Health for several years in the early twentieth century.

(SEE ALSO: Reed, Walter; Yellow Fever; Vector-Borne Diseases)

— NIGEL PANETH

The Cuban physician and epidemiologist Carlos Juan Finlay (1833-1915) discovered that certain mosquitoes transmit yellow fever.

Carlos Juan Finlay was born in Camagüey Province on Dec. 3, 1833, of a Scottish father and a French mother. He spent his early years on his father's coffee plantation but soon was sent to school in France and England. From there he traveled to the United States, where he received a degree in medicine at Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, in 1855. He returned to Cuba and began to practice medicine after revalidating his degree at the University of Havana. From Cuba he traveled to Peru, Trinidad, and France, working in various hospitals. In 1870 he settled in Cuba permanently, developing an interest in the island's sanitary and health problems.

When, in 1879, an American mission arrived in Cuba to study the causes of yellow fever, the Spanish government designated Finlay to work with the group. He developed the idea that the transmission of yellow fever required a vector. At the International Sanitary Conference, held in Washington in February 1881, he explained his theory. In August Finlay read before the Academy of Sciences of Havana his historic work showing a mosquito, Culex fasciatus or Stegomyia fasciata (later known as Aedes aegypti), to be the vector of the yellow fever organism. Although Finlay advanced numerous experiments and observations to support his conclusions, his theory was not accepted by the scientific world for almost 2 decades. In a report to the International Sanitary Conference held in Havana in 1901, Walter Reed confirmed Finlay's discovery.

When United States troops landed in Cuba in 1898 during the Spanish-American War, Finlay worked with the American army in Santiago de Cuba. He further tested his theories in practice and advocated a campaign against the mosquito. As a result of his urgings, W. C. Gorgas, United States health chief in Cuba, began a program, later extended to Panama, to exterminate the mosquito, thus putting an end to a sickness that had plagued the Caribbean for many years.

In addition to his work in the epidemiology of yellow fever, Finlay wrote extensively on ophthalmology, tuberculosis, tetanus, trichinosis, filariasis, leprosy, beriberi, cholera, and exophthalmic goiter. After the establishment of the Cuban Republic in 1902, he was appointed public health chief, and the Cuban government created in his honor the Finlay Institute for Investigations in Tropical Medicine. Finlay died in Havana on Aug. 20, 1915.

Further Reading

Carlos E. Finlay, Carlos Finlay and Yellow Fever (1940), is a valuable work by Finlay's son and includes most of the Cuban scientist's writings on yellow fever, as well as a section on his life. A collection of essays on Finlay published by the Cuban Ministry of Public Health is Dr. Carlos J. Finlay and the "Hall of Fame" (1959). See also Enrique Saladrigás y Zayas, A Tribute to Finlay (1952).

Carlos Finlay
Carlos Finlay
Born	December 3, 1833 Puerto Principe, Cuba
Died	August 20, 1915 Havana
Nationality	Cuba
Ethnicity	Scottish/French
Fields	Medicine
Alma mater	Jefferson Medical College
Known for	Mosquito and yellow fever

Carlos Juan Finlay (born Juan Carlos Finlay y Barrés; December 3, 1833, Puerto Principe, Cuba – August 20, 1915, Havana, Cuba) was a Cuban physician and scientist, recognized as a pioneer in yellow fever research.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early life and education 1.2 Professional career 2 See also 3 Footnotes 4 References

Biography

Early life and education

Finlay was born in Puerto Principe, Cuba, of French and Scottish descent. He changed his name to Carlos Juan Finlay later in his life. In 1853 he attended Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He graduated in 1855, and completed his studies in Havana and in Paris. Afterwards he settled in Havana and opened a medical practice.

Professional career

Finlay's work, carried out during the 1870s, finally came to prominence in 1900. He was the first to theorize, in 1881, that a mosquito was a carrier, now known as a disease vector, of the organism causing yellow fever: a mosquito that bites a victim of the disease could then bite a healthy person and spread the disease. A year later Finlay identified a mosquito of the genus Aedes as the organism transmitting yellow fever. His theory was followed by the recommendation to control the mosquito population as a way to control the spread of the disease.

El Obelisco, Finlay's memorial in Havana.

His hypothesis and exhaustive proofs were confirmed nearly twenty years later by the Walter Reed Commission of 1900. Finlay went on to become the chief health officer of Cuba from 1902 to 1909. Although Dr. Reed received much of the credit in history books for "beating" yellow fever, Reed himself credited Dr. Finlay with the discovery of the yellow fever vector, and thus how it might be controlled. Dr. Reed often cited Finlay's papers in his own articles and gave him credit for the discovery, even in his personal correspondence.^[1]

In the words of General Leonard Wood, a physician and U.S. military governor of Cuba in 1900: "The confirmation of Dr. Finlay's doctrine is the greatest step forward made in medical science since Jenner's discovery of the vaccination (of smallpox)."

This discovery helped William C. Gorgas of Alabama reduce the incidence and prevalence of mosquito-borne diseases in Panama during the American campaign from 1903 onwards to construct the Panama Canal. Prior to this, about 10% of the workforce died each year from malaria and yellow fever.

In the city of Marianao in Havana, Cuba, there is a monument honoring Dr. Finlay. This monument has the shape of a syringe and it is usually referred to as El Obelisco (The Obelisk). Finlay was also commemorated on a 1981 Cuban stamp.^[2] A statue commemorating Dr. Finlay is located on the bayfront in Panama City, near the canal he helped make possible. The UNESCO Carlos J. Finlay Prize for Microbiology is named in his honor.

Dr. Finlay was a member of Havana's Royal Academy of Medical, Physical and Natural Sciences. He was fluent in French, German, Spanish, and English, and could read Latin. His interests were widespread and he wrote articles on subjects as varied as leprosy, cholera, gravity, and plant diseases. But his main interest was yellow fever, and he was the author of 40 articles on this disease. His theory that an intermediary host was responsible for the spread of the disease was treated with ridicule for years. A humane man, he often took on patients who could not afford medical care. Dr. Finlay was nominated seven times for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, but would never be awarded it.^[3]

See also

Cuba portal

• Healthcare of Cuba

Footnotes

1. ^ Pierce J.R., J, Writer. 2005. Yellow Jack: How Yellow Fever Ravaged America and Walter Reed Discovered its Deadly Secrets. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 0-471-47261-1
2. ^ "Cuba - Mosquito". http://www.bugsonstamps.com/cuba/cuba_15_mosquito_2431.htm. 
3. ^ Crosby, M.C. 2006. The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, The Epidemic That Shaped Our History. Berkley Books. ISBN 0-425-21202-5

References

• Del Regato, J A (2001). "Carlos Juan Finlay (1833-1915)". Journal of public health policy 22 (1): 98–104. doi:10.2307/3343556. PMID 11382093. 
• Tan, S Y; Sung H (May 2008). "Carlos Juan Finlay (1833-1915): of mosquitoes and yellow fever". Singapore medical journal 49 (5): 370–1. PMID 18465043. 
• Amster, L J (May 1987). "Carlos J. Finlay: the mosquito man". Hosp. Pract. (Off. Ed.) 22 (5): 223–5, 229–30, 233 passim. PMID 3106375. 
• Del Regato, J A. "Carlos Finlay and the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine". The Pharos of Alpha Omega Alpha-Honor Medical Society. Alpha Omega Alpha 50 (2): 5–9. PMID 3299405. 
• , (Dec 1966). "Carlos J. Finlay (1833-1915) student of yellow fever". JAMA 198 (11): 1210–1. doi:10.1001/jama.198.11.1210. PMID 5332541. 
• Rodriguez Cabarrocas, R (Aug 1960). "Carlos J. FINLAY and yellow fever". The Bulletin of the Tulane Medical Faculty 19: 219–28. PMID 13742573. 
• Mellander, Gustavo A. (1971) The United States in Panamanian Politics: The Intriguing Formative Years. Danville, Ill.: Interstate Publishers. OCLC 138568.
• Mellander, Gustavo A.; Nelly Maldonado Mellander (1999). Charles Edward Magoon: The Panama Years. Río Piedras, Puerto Rico: Editorial Plaza Mayor. ISBN 1563281554. OCLC 42970390.
• Pierce J.R., J, Writer. 2005. Yellow Jack: How Yellow Fever Ravaged America and Walter Reed Discovered its Deadly Secrets. John Wiley and Sons. ISBN 0-471-47261-1
• Crosby, M.C. 2006. The American Plague: The Untold Story of Yellow Fever, The Epidemic That Shaped Our History. Berkley Books. ISBN 0-425-21202-5

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