September 2026 Navy Medicine Fast Facts – USA Typhus Commission
https://www.dvidshub.net/publication/issues/77758
In this issue, we look back at the United States of America Typhus Commission (USATC) and how its groundbreaking work paved the way for NAMRU-EURAFCENT.
Eighty years ago, the Naval Medical Research Unit EURAFCENT (originally NAMRU-3) began its storied history at the Abbassia Fever Hospital in Cairo, Egypt. During its tenure in Cairo, this command became the largest U.S. military-led biomedical research laboratory outside of the continental United States (OCONUS). But before charting an impressive record fighting, studying and tracking infectious and parasitic diseases, and even before there was a NAMRU-3, Navy Medicine had built a sturdy scientific foundation in Cairo with the Navy Epidemiological Unit #50 and the USATC.
USATC was a true joint-service success story. Established by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1942, it originally operated under the directorship of Rear Adm. Charles Stephenson, a Navy medical officer and a leading tropical medicine expert. The commission brought together personnel from the Navy, Army and Public Health Service, reported to the Secretary of War (Army), and operated in close coordination with the Department of State. Its teams spanned Africa, the Middle East, and Europe where they studied and worked to control typhus fever, helping to reduce its impact on warfighters, with Cairo serving as its primary base of operations.