The record
The defining act
In Cuba in 1900, Lazear showed that mosquitoes which had fed on yellow-fever patients could transmit the disease to volunteers. His notes indicate that he also experimented on himself. He developed yellow fever and died on September 25.
What was at stake
Yellow fever repeatedly devastated cities and military camps. Establishing how it spread would make prevention possible, but the work exposed researchers and volunteers to a disease with no reliable cure.
What followed
The commission opened Camp Lazear, where follow-up experiments confirmed the mosquito connection. The finding helped turn yellow-fever control toward eliminating the insect vector.
Why Pax Terra remembers them
He helped move medicine from superstition toward prevention at the cost of his life.
Context
The work built on Cuban physician Carlos Finlay's earlier mosquito theory and was carried out by a four-person commission. Lazear's contribution was decisive, but not solitary.