West African colonial health shifts predated and drove metropolitan policy

Evidence

Dakar, however, had not needed Paris to point the way. The reorganization of the AMI in 1912 had recommended that medical personnel tour their districts regularly for the same reasons. During the war, the demands for African manpower made prevention of the endemic and epidemic diseases and the fight against infant mortality among Africans a new priority of the Government General. At the same time, a drastic drop in the number of doctors in the federation-from around 100 in 1912 to 67 in 1921-also put health care back on the agenda. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 773

Categorization

• QUESTION: Worth chasing whether the federation or metropole was the real origin of interwar preventive-medicine policy—evidence here points to Dakar leading Paris.