American Murderer: The Parasite That Haunted the South

This book investigates hookworm’s devastating effects in the American South during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It explains how larvae could enter through skin, often bare feet, then travel through the body to the small intestine, where they fed on a host’s blood. The account covers Charles Wardell Stiles’s identification of the species and efforts to reduce its spread, including public education, testing, treatment, and improved sanitation advocated by the Rockefeller Sanitary Commission.