[leish-l] Baghdad Boil --

[Humberto Guerra]

Mr. Singfield:

Just to set the record a bit straighter, the name 'Baghdad boil' is definitely old; I cite the oldest book I have on Tropical Medicine:

Strong H. 1941. In Stitt's Diagnosis, Prevention and Treatment of Tropical Diseases, Strong H. Sixth Edition, 1941. The Blakiston Co., Philadelphia.

Strong says, in Chapter V, THE LEISHMANIASES (page 229): 

Synonyms. - For Indian Kala-azar, - dumdum fever, tropical splenomegaly, black sickness; for infantile kala-azar, - splenic ahaemia of infants, ponos; for Eastern cutaneous leishmaniasis, - oriental sore, Delhi boil, Biskra button, Bagdad boil, bouton d'Orient, Aleppo boil, granuloma endemicum, salek (Persia); for American cutaneous leishmaniasis, - espundia, bubas, uta, forest yaws.

In the same book, in Chapter VI, CUTANEOUS LEISHMANIASES (page 293) Strong says, under: 

HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION

Geographical Distribution and Prevalence.- 
........
.......
It has been reported by reliable observers that in Bagdad nearly every child is attacked, and that it is quite exceptional for any native to attain maturity without having had one or more of these sores, and that every woman in Bagdad has on her face the ravages of this disease.

I'm certain there are much older references to the term Bagdad boil or Baghdad boil.

Humberto Guerra, M.D., Ph.D., Dr.Med.
hguerra at upch.edu.pe
Professor of Medicine
Instituto de Medicina Tropical Alexander von Humboldt
Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia
Postal Address: A.P. 4314, Lima 100, Perú
Street Address: Av. Honorio Delgado 430, Lima 31, Perú
Tel: (51-1) 482-3903, 482-3910
Fax: (51-1) 4823404




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Peter Singfield" <snkm at btl.net>
To: <leish-l at fat.org.br>
Sent: Friday, December 05, 2003 11:49 AM
Subject: [leish-l] Baghdad Boil --


> 
> New name for cutaneous Leishmaniasis??
> 
> Baghdad Boil' disease afflicts 148 GIs in Iraq 
> 
> 05.12.2003 [17:15] 
>   
> 
> Nearly 150 U.S. soldiers in Iraq have been diagnosed with a parasitic skin
> disease and hundreds more could unknowingly be infected, doctors reported
> Thursday. 
> 
> Doctors fear that soldiers returning from the front may consult doctors in
> the United States who have never seen the disease. Complicating matters:
> The best drug used to treat it is not licensed in the United States. 
> 
> Leishmaniasis, which soldiers have coined the "Baghdad Boil," is carried by
> biting sand flies and doesn't spread from person to person. It causes skin
> lesions that if untreated may take months, even years, to heal. The lesions
> can be disfiguring, doctors say. 
> 
> So far, 148 soldiers have confirmed cases, but hundreds more are expected,
> says Army Lt. Col. Russell Coleman, an entomologist who spent 10 months in
> Iraq with the 520th Theater Army Medical Laboratory. He reported the
> outbreak Thursday to the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene,
> meeting in Philadelphia. 
> 
> Sand flies are active during warm weather, and soon after U.S. troops
> arrived in Iraq in late March, "we started seeing soldiers basically eaten
> alive," Coleman says. "They'd get a hundred, in some cases 1,000 bites in a
> single night." 
> 
> Insect repellents and bed nets are standard issue, Coleman says, but many
> units failed to pack them when they were deployed. 
> 
> The sand flies have vanished with the cooler weather in Iraq, but because
> of a long incubation period, lesions may not appear for six months or
> longer after infection occurs. Coleman and Army Lt. Col. Peter Weina, a
> leishmaniasis expert still in Iraq, predicted in April that there would be
> 400 cases. 
> 
> All affected soldiers are being sent to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in
> Washington, D.C., to be treated with the drug Pentosam. 
> 
>  
>  USA Today 
> 
> Article found at:
> 
> http://www1.iraqwar.ru/iraq-read_article.php?articleId=28318&lang=en
>  
> 
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