Fever City: Dengue in Colonial Hong Kong

Abstract

This paper forms part of the first comprehensive study of the history of dengue fever in Asia, and centres on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Despite a paucity of records, allusions to dengue nonetheless pervade the annual reports of colonial officials, miscellaneous government correspondence, and travel accounts, and the disease was extensively discussed in the historical medico-scientific literature. Although constructing a comprehensive history of dengue remains a challenge, an investigation of the available materials provides an original vantage point for reflecting on critical debates in the history of medicine and colonialism in Asia. Namely, how have disease identities been developed by native and colonial medical professionals and laypersons? And how were environmental assumptions reworked through the lens of tropical medicine?