An experiment that failed: malaria control at Mian Mir

Abstract

With the discovery of the role of the Anopheles mosquito in the transmission of malaria came the goal of mosquito control as a public health measure. One of the early experiments (1902-1909) in mosquito control was conducted at the military cantonment at Mian Mir, near Lahore in present-day Pakistan. The experiment attached much attention and comment, especially from Ronald Ross who argued that it had been badly planned and inadequately funded. Mian Mir certainly demonstrated that mosquito eradication was difficult to achieve and unlikely to be inexpensive, and is said to have influenced subsequent malaria programmes in India and elsewhere.