Sterilization of the feebleminded

Summary

• 1. The malarial course and therapeutic results in 123 patients (88 females and 35 males) inoculated with a sexual strain were identical with those noted in over 350 patients inoculated with an “asexual” strain of malaria.

• 2. After seven months the sexual strain of malaria began to lose its capacity to produce gametocytes. During the succeeding nine months this was found to be much more striking in female than in male patients. Approximately one-third of all the female patients having malarial parasites failed to reveal the presence of any sexual forms of the plasmodium.

• 3. The sexual strain of malaria becomes biologically adapted to its host upon repeated human passage, as evidenced by its increasing failure to produce gametocytes.