Carlos J. Finlay
| Carlos Finlay | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | Juan Carlos Finlay y de Barrés December 3, 1833 Puerto Príncipe, Cuba |
| Died | August 20, 1915 (aged 81) Havana, Cuba |
| Nationality | Cuban |
| Alma mater | Jefferson Medical College |
| Known for | Mosquito and yellow fever research |
Carlos Juan Finlay (December 3, 1833 – August 20, 1915) was a Cuban epidemiologist recognized as a pioneer in the research of yellow fever, determining that it was transmitted through mosquitoes.
Finlay was born Juan Carlos Finlay y de Barrés in Puerto Príncipe (now Camagüey), Cuba. At that time Cuba was part of the Kingdom of Spain. He reversed the order of his given names to "Carlos Juan" later in his life.
His father was a physician who had fought alongside Simón Bolívar, and his family owned a coffee plantation in Alquízar. He attended school in France in 1844, but was forced to return to Cuba after two years because he contracted cholera. After recovering, he returned to Europe in 1848, but became stuck in England for another two years due to political turmoil, and after arriving in France to continue his education, he contracted typhoid fever and again returned to Cuba.
Because the University of Havana would not recognize his European academic credits, he enrolled at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which did not require prerequisites. Here Finlay met John Kearsley Mitchell, a proponent of the germ theory of disease, and his son Silas Weir Mitchell, who supervised his studies. He graduated from Jefferson Medical College in 1855.
He then returned to Havana and set up an ophthalmology practice in 1857, and then studied in Paris from 1860 to 1861. In October 1865 he married Adela Shine, a native of the Island of Trinidad. They would have three sons, Charles, George and Frank.
Finlay's work, carried out during the 1870s, finally came to prominence in 1900. He was the first to theorize, in 1881, that a mosquito was a carrier, now known as a disease vector, of the organism causing yellow fever: a mosquito that bites a victim of the disease could subsequently bite and thereby infect a healthy person. He presented this theory at the 1881 International Sanitary Conference, where it was well received. A year later Finlay identified a mosquito of the genus Aedes as the organism transmitting yellow fever. His theory was followed by the recommendation to control the mosquito population as a way to control the spread of the disease.
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