James Lind
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{{for|the American congressman|James F. Lind}}
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[[Image:James lind.jpg|thumb|right|200px|James Lind|A portrait of Scottish doctor James Lind (1716-1794)]]
'''James Lind''' ([[1716]] in [[Edinburgh]] – [[1794]] in [[Gosport]]) was the pioneer of naval [[hygiene]] in the [[Royal Navy]]. By conducting the first ever [[clinical trial]],
<ref>{{cite book |last=Simon |first=Harvey B. |title=The Harvard Medical School guide to men's health |publisher=[[Free Press]] |location=New York |year=2002 |pages=31 |isbn=0-684-87181-5}}</ref> he proved that [[citrus fruits]] cured [[scurvy]]. He also proposed that [[fresh water]] could be obtained by [[distillation|distilling]] [[sea water]]. He also fought for the drying of ships by using better ventilation, improved the clothing and cleanliness of sailors,{{Fact|date=May 2008}} and introduced fumigation with [[sulphur]] and [[arsenic]].{{Verify source|date=May 2008}} By his work he also influenced practices of [[preventive medicine]] and good [[nutrition]] among British soldiers.
==Early life==
{{Unreferencedsection|date=May 2008}}
James Lind began as an apprentice of George Langlands, a fellow of the [[Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh]].{{Verify source|date=May 2008}} In [[1739]], he entered the Navy as a surgeon's mate, serving in the [[Mediterranean]], off the coast of West Africa, and in the West Indies. By [[1746]] he had become surgeon of ''HMS Salisbury'' in the Channel Fleet. Two years later he retired from the Navy, wrote up his MD thesis on [[venereal diseases]], and was granted a license to practice in [[Edinburgh]], Scotland.
==Legacy==
===A cure for scurvy===
{{seealso|Scurvy}}
Scurvy is a disease now known to be caused by a deficiency of [[vitamin C]], but in Lind's day, the concept of [[vitamin]]s was unknown. Vitamin C is necessary for the maintenance of healthy and connective tissue. Its deficiency causes ulcers to form in the lower legs and feet, excessive bleeding, loss of teeth and hair, opening of old wounds, [[Clinical depression|depression]], [[hallucination]]s,{{Fact|date=May 2008}} [[blindness]],{{Fact|date=May 2008}} and eventually death.
In [[1740]] the catastrophic result of [[George Anson, 1st Baron Anson|Anson]]'s circumnavigation attracted much attention in Europe; out of 1900 men, 1400 had died, most of them allegedly from having contracted scurvy. According to Lind, scurvy caused more deaths in the British fleets than French and Spanish arms.{{clarifyme}}
Since the [[1600]]s, it had been known that [[citrus fruit]] had an [[antiscorbutic]] effect, when a surgeon of the [[British East India Company]] recommended them,{{clarifyme}} but their use wasn't widespread. Although Lind was not the first to suggest citrus fruit as a cure for scurvy, he was the first to study their effect by a systematic [[Controlled experiment|experiment]] in [[1747]].{{Verify source|date=May 2008}} It ranks as one of the first clinical experiments in the history of medicine.
Lind thought that scurvy was due to [[putrefaction]] of the body which could be prevented by [[acid]]s; that is why he chose to experiment with dietary supplements of [[acid]]ic quality. In his experiment he divided twelve scorbutic sailors into six groups. They all received the same diet, and in addition group one was given a quart of [[cider]] daily, group two twenty-five drops of elixir of [[vitriol]], group three six spoonful of [[vinegar]], group four half a pint of seawater, group five received two [[orange (fruit)|orange]]s and one lemon and the last group a spicy paste plus a drink of [[barley]] water. The treatment of group five stopped after six days when they ran out of fruit, but by that time one sailor was fit for duty and the other had almost recovered. Apart from that, only group one also showed some effect of its treatment.
Shortly after this experiment Lind retired from the Navy and at first practised privately as a physician. In [[1753]] he published ''A treatise of the scurvy'', which was virtually ignored. In [[1758]] he was appointed chief physician of the Royal Naval Hospital Haslar at [[Portsmouth]]. When [[James Cook]] went on his first voyage he carried [[wort]] (0.1 mg vitamin C per 100 g), [[sauerkraut]] (10-15 mg per 100 g) and a syrup of oranges and lemons (the juice contains 40-60 mg of vitamin C per 100 g) as antiscorbutics, but only the results of the trials on wort were published. In [[1762]] Lind’s ''Essay on the most effectual means of preserving the health of seamen'' appeared. In it he recommended growing salad, i.e. [[watercress]] (662 mg vitamin C per 100 g) on wet blankets. This was actually put in practice, and in the winter of [[1775]] the British Army in North America was supplied with mustard and cress seeds. Lind also continued to advocate citrus fruit. But because he – and most other physicians – still believed that their curative effect was due to the acid, it was reasonable to substitute them with cheaper acids.
It was [[Gilbert Blane]] who implemented citrus fruit. In an experiment in [[1794]] lemon juice was issued on board the ''Suffolk'' on a twenty-three week, non-stop voyage to India. The daily ration of two-thirds of an ounce mixed in [[grog]] contained just about the minimum daily intake of 10 mg vitamin C. There was no serious outbreak of scurvy. The following year the [[Admiralty]] took up the general issue of lemon juice to the whole fleet. This was not the end of scurvy in the Navy, as lemon juice was considered as a cure for scurvy and consequentially was dispensed by the ship's surgeon. Only after [[1800]] were the preventive qualities increasingly recognised.<ref> Macdonald, Janet (2006). ''Feeding Nelson’s Navy. The True Story of Food at Sea in the Georgian Era.'' Chatham, London. ISBN-10 1-86176-288-7, p. 154-166.</ref>
===Fresh water from the sea===
In the 18th century sailors took along water and beer in casks and used rain water when available. According to the ''Regulations and Instructions relating to His Majesty's Service at Sea'', which had been published for the first time in [[1733]] by the Admiralty, sailors were entitled to a [[gallon]] of weak [[beer]] daily (5/6 of the usual British gallon, equivalent to the modern American gallon or slightly more than three and a half [[litre]]s). As the beer had been boiled in the [[brewing]] process it was reasonably free from bacteria and lasted for months unlike water kept in a cask for the same time. In the [[Mediterranean]], [[wine]] was also issued, often fortified with [[brandy]].
For example, a frigate with 240 men, equipped with stores for four months, carried more than hundred tons of drinking water. Water quality depended on the original source of the water, the condition of the casks and for how long it had been kept. During normal times sailors were allowed to take as much water from a guarded butt as they wanted, but weren't allowed to take any water away. When water got scarce, it was rationed and rain water was collected with spread sails. Fresh water was also collected when an opportunity presented itself ''en voyage'', but watering places were often marshy, and in the tropics infested by [[malaria]].
In [[1758]], Lind discovered that the steam of heated salt water was fresh and tasted like rain water. He also proposed to use [[solar energy]] for the distillation of water. But only when a new type of cooking stove was introduced in [[1810]] did the possibility arise of producing fresh water by distillation on a useful scale.
==Later life==
From 1758-1783, James Lind worked as a senior physician of the [[Royal Naval Hospital Haslar]]. This occupation was later succeeded by his son.{{Fact|date=May 2008}} In [[1794]], he died at [[Gosport]] and was buried in Portchester Church. He is commemorated by a plaque in the Medical School of the [[University of Edinburgh]].
==References==
<references/>
==External links==
* [http://www.jameslindlibrary.org/trial_records/17th_18th_Century/lind/lind_biog.php James Lind Library (including biography and extracts from Lind's most important works)]
* [http://www.lind.org.zw The Lind pages with reference to the Lind family in general including a family tree and other family documents]
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[[Category:1716 births]]
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[[Category:People from Edinburgh]]
[[Category:Scottish doctors]]
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