Cholera epidemics on Reunion Island during the 19th century

Abstract

The first cholera outbreak on Bourbon Island (now Reunion Island) was recorded in January 1820. The disease was imported from Mauritius Island aboard the steamer Pivert. The epidemic began on Mauritius in November 1819 after the English frigate, La Topaze, called from Calcutta, India. Dr. François Vinson demonstrated the transmissibility of cholera during this epidemic. Drastic sanitary measures spared Reunion from the two epidemics on Mauritius Island, in 1854 and 1856. The second outbreak of cholera on Reunion Island was recorded on March 6, 1859. The disease was introduced from East Africa by the steamer Mascareignes, which carried indentured servants. The captain (d'Agnel) et the supercargo (Menon) of the steamer claimed to the doctor who boarded the ship before landing that no passengers or crew had had cholera, in flagrant contradiction to the autopsy report issued by Navy surgeon Alfred Vaillant, who had concluded that cholera was present when the vessel left the African coast. This report was withheld from the boarding physician. Cholera spread quickly on the island and affected the poorest people, especially freed slaves, most severely. Dr. Petit, the chief Navy Physician and Director of the Health Department, obtained a confession by Menon about the fraudulent statements. On January 24, 1860, a trial for public health endangerment began on Reunion Island; it ended on February 1 with a not-guilty verdict, based largely on the testimony of several island doctors that cholera was not contagious.