Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-7qhmt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-27T20:14:58.553Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Studies on populations of head-lice (Pediculus humanus capitis: Anoplura)

III. Material from South India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 April 2009

P. A. Buxton
Affiliation:
From the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Extract

The author has examined 1437 crops of hair, removed from adult or adolescent males on admission to jail, at Cannanore, South India. There is a high positive correlation between weight of hair and rate of infestation with head-lice, men with less than 10 g. of hair being 14·6% infested, those with 10–19·9 g. 39·9%, and those with over 20 g. 56–59%.

There appears to be a negative correlation with age, but this seems to be due to the older men having less hair: if one standardizes hair weight there is no tendency for older men to be less infested than younger. In a similar way, the large differences in rate of infestation between different religious groups appear to be due to a great extent (but not entirely) to differences in hair weight.

No evidence was found that rate of infestation is different at different times of year. The rates in the rainy and dry seasons scarcely differ, in spite of the intensity of the rain, and of the fact that the rainless period lasts for six months. It is possible that there is a long-period, secular change in rate of infestation.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1940

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Buxton, P. A. (1936). Studies on populations of head-lice (Pediculus humanus capitis: Anoplura). I. Parasitology, 28, 92–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buxton, P. A. (1938). Studies on populations of head-lice (Pediculus humanus capitis: Anoplura). II. Parasitology, 30, 85110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buxton, P. A. (1939). The Louse. London: Edward Arnold.Google Scholar