[Discovery of the adult Schistosoma japonicum, a causative agent of Schistosomiasis in the Katayama area of Hiroshima Prefecture].

Abstract

People in the Katayama area of Hiroshima Prefecture had been afraid of a curious disease for a long time. The causative agent for the disease had not been identified through the beginning of the 20th century when it turned out that a human parasitic trematode, Schistosoma japonicum, had been afflicting the inhabitants, causing this disease. This was made clear mainly by two medical doctors, Akira Fujinami and Ryuzo Yoshida, much before 1909. The memoir on the disease described by a herb doctor, Yoshinao Fujii (1847), was made known by A. Fujinami to medical scientists in 1909.