Myxomatosis

The outbreaks of myxomatosis among rabbits in Australia in 1950 and in Europe in 1952 provided scientists with opportunities of observing the course of the interaction of a very lethal virus disease with a large population of highly susceptible mammals, i.e. with a model system to study the evolution of an infectious disease, and the effects of an infectious disease on the evolution of a mammal. This scientific account of the spread of the disease in Australia and Europe, of its effects upo...