The burden of early exposure to malaria in the United States, 1850-1860: Malnutrition and immune disorders

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: University of Chicago
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC HISTORY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-0507
• DOI: 10.1017/S0022050707000472
• 发表日期: 2007
• 页码: 1001-1035
• 关键词: falciparum-malaria; plasmodium-vivax; older men; childhood; IMPACT; CHILDREN; diarrhea; transmission; 20th-century; morbidity

摘要

This article uses nineteenth-century evidence to calculate the impact of early exposure to malaria-ridden environments on nutritional status and the immune system in America. I estimate the risk of contracting malarial fevers in the 1850s by using correlations between malaria and environmental factors such as climate and geographical features. The study demonstrates that Union Army recruits who spent their early years in malaria-endemic counties were 1.1 inches shorter at enlistment due to malnutrition and were 13 percent more susceptible to infections during the U.S. Civil War as a result of immune disorders than were those from malaria-free regions.