Fighting the Fever
Kala-azar in Eastern India, 1870s–1940s

Explores the history of black fever as an epidemic and the battles to contain it.

Achintya Kumar Dutta (Author)

9781009568203, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 3 April 2025

414 pages
23.5 x 16 x 3 cm, 0.768 kg

The book investigates certain obscure but important aspects of the social history of disease and medicine in colonial eastern India, covering Assam, Bengal, and Bihar and Orissa-against the backdrop of the outbreak of a lethal disease called kala-azar, or black fever, scientifically known as visceral leishmaniasis, which spread its wings as an epidemic from the 1870s-and chisels out the interaction between the microbe behind the disease and medical interventionism on the one hand and health officials and the state on the other. The book does not narrate a simple account of disease and health. Instead, it analyses the social history of kala-azar in British east India in addition to revealing the hitherto undiscovered areas of research in the field of medical history.

List of Figures
List of Maps
List of Tables
Preface and Acknowledgements
Note on Permissions
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Kala-azar: A Disease Sui Generis
2. Medical Intervention and Containment of Epidemics
3. Agony of Assam: Defeating the Dreadful Kala-azar
4. Bengal's Black Fever Burden: Beating the Disease
5. 'Black Sigh' in Bihar: Experiences and Responses
6. From Tartar Emetic to Urea Stibamine: Medical Research on Kala-azar and Its Fruition
7. The Unsung Hero: The Genius of Upendra Nath Brahmachari
Conclusion
Appendix: Number of Kala-azar Patients Admitted for Treatment in Bengal
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Asian history [HBJF]