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Isolation of Japanese B Virus on Okinawa in 1945, Serologic Diagnosis, Clinical Manifestations, Epidemiologic Aspects and Use of Mouse Brain Vaccine

ALBERT B. SABIN, M.D.

J Am Med Assoc. 1947;133(5):281-293.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

A disease clinically similar to the Japanese B type of epidemic encephalitis was known to occur during the late summer months on Okinawa, predominantly among children.¹ However, it was not established that the Japanese B virus was the etiologic agent. On July 8, 1945 several cases of encephalitis were recognized in the native population on Heanza Shima, a small island 2 miles east of Okinawa, by Lieut. L. M. Miller, and on July 10, 1945 Lieut. Comdr. (later Comdr.) Leon Lewis (MC), U.S.N.R., of the Military Government discovered 4 patients with encephalitis in a large civilian hospital on Okinawa.² By the end of July, with the aid of the complement fixation test developed by Casals and Palacios³ a diagnosis of epidemic encephalitis due to virus infection of the Japanese B type was made in several of these early cases by members of the Naval Medical Research Unit . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

Author Affiliations
Cincinnati

From the Children's Hospital Research Foundation, Department of Pediatrics, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine.

Footnotes
The work in Okinawa, Japan, and subsequently in the United States of America was performed while Dr. Sabin served as a Lieutenant Colonel, Medical Corps, with the Army Epidemiological Board, Preventive Medicine Service, Office of the Surgeon General, United States Army. The investigation was sponsored by the Commission on Neurotropic Virus Diseases, Army Epidemiological Board. Drs. W. McD. Hammon and W. C. Reeves, who came to Okinawa at the end of August 1945, continued with investigations of the outbreak after my departure, and I am greatly indebted to them for many observations.

I wish to express my indebtedness and thanks to Brig. Gen. S. Bayne-Jones, Deputy Chief, Preventive Medicine Service, Office of the Surgeon General, for this interesting assignment and for all the arrangements which made it possible to carry out this work and to Col. James B. Stapleton, Col. Walter B. Martin, Major W. G. Downs, Major W. L. Forman, Major A. S. Benenson and Major (later Lieut. Col.) Harvey G. Taylor of the Medical Corps, and Capt. Carl T. Parsons of the Sanitary Corps, Army of the United States, as well as to Lieut. Comdr. W. Kees, Lieut. Comdr. (later Comdr.) Leon Lewis and Lieut. Wm. E. Mosher of the Medical Corps, United States Naval Reserves, for their help during the course of the work on Okinawa.

In the preparation of this paper the attempt has not been made to review the voluminous Japanese literature on Japanese B encephalitis, or to compare the findings herein reported with those claimed by Japanese scientists. Most of the work on encephalitis in Japan has been published in the Japanese language, which is a distinct barrier, and furthermore, since 1941 their medical journals have had scant international circulation. For these reasons the bulk of their recent work on this disease has been unavailable for review at the time of writing this paper.

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