Herrman L. Blumgart, M.D., and George M. Pike, M.D.
The problems confronting the U.S. Army Medical Department in USAFIBT (U.S. Army Forces, India-Burma Theater) can be understood only in relation to the environment in which the personnel of this theater worked. The climate, the lack of modern sanitation, the wild and primitive regions of the Stilwell Road (formerly Ledo Road) country in which some units operated, and the close proximity of the native Indian population in other areas created peculiar, if not unique, medical problems. Few, if any regions excel India and Burma in the variety and profusion of disease. One million persons die annually of malaria while a hundred million suffer clinical attacks yearly, and 250,000 die of pulmonary tuberculosis, according to the most reliable estimates available. Endemic foci of the three major plagues--smallpox, cholera, and plague--constantly smolder in India and are among its principal medical exports. Each and every one of these factors posed particular medical problems or influenced professional policies and must be appreciated in any review of medical problems in this theater.
