The Role Of Yellow Fever And The Regional Dynamics More...

McNeill favors the role of yellow fever in the regional dynamics more heavily than malaria. He is likely accounting for the swift and virulent nature of a virus over that of the parasite. The seasoned locals would have acquired immunity to yellow fever, but what about resistance to malaria? This question would then likely become a racial aspect, and the creole and slave populations would be a factor. McNeill names the theories differential immunity and differential resistance (differential resistance referring to the Sickle Cell and Duffy mutations). He specifically states that an inherited immunity to yellow fever does exist but is not proven and that acquired immunity in childhood sufficiently explained local and African advantage.†¦show more content†¦Europeans again fell victim quickly decimating the ranks, while locals, whether seasoned whites, or those of African descent seasoned or with resistance or immunities, persevered. McNeill shows that even Spain with its entrenched local population, was a â€Å"victim† in the end, as locals, including local troops, revolted in the nineteenth century, and the Spanish troops brought in succumbed quickly to disease. McNeill’s views align with other scholars discussed previously in this paper, in that falciparum and yellow fever arrived with the enslaved Africans, the plantation system created the environment for slavery and for yellow fever and malaria to flourish. McNeill also aligns with Philip Curtin’s original argument. Ecology plays an important role in events, and no matter the force of human agency, the evolution of the changing environment impeded the will of the European powers. McNeill does not discount human agency, but he considers a larger context, the impact of the disease environment on geopolitics, rather than only studying the local disease experience or the human actions that caused the disease environment outside of a larger context. Billy G. Smith examines the efforts of British abolitionists to establish a slave free colony on an island off the coast of Africa and subsequently follows the voyage of the transport