James Alison Glover

James Alison Glover (21 February 1874 – 17 September 1963) was a British physician, known for his epidemiological studies associating carrier rates of meningococcus with overcrowding, revealing geographic variations in the number of tonsillectomies in school children in England and Wales, and showing that cases of rheumatic fever occurred after outbreaks of sore throats caused by Streptococcus pyogenes.

Early life and education James Glover was born on 21 February 1876 in Highbury, North London, to physician James Grey Glover and Mary Muller. He completed his early education at St Paul's School before gaining admission to St. John’s College, Cambridge, where he earned a bachelor's degree in the Natural Science Tripos in 1897. Once his medical skills were discovered, he was seconded to No. 2 Field Hospital of the New South Wales Army Medical Corps as an honorary lieutenant. There he studied carrier rates of meningococcus and associated high carrier rates with overcrowding and meningitis epidemics. He found that "spacing-out" of beds prevented epidemics of meningitis in the military. The finding earned him the reputation of being a "good friend of the private soldier". He published three main reports relating to rheumatology. He noted that tonsillitis occurred more frequently in girls, yet boys underwent tonsillectomy more frequently. His paper revealed that the number of tonsil operations was not related to the number of cases of tonsil disease, and found no other explanation for the variation other than differences in indication for surgery and medical opinion. The paper is considered a "classic" and a "core component of health services research using epidemiology for understanding rates of intervention as opposed to disease". For the years 1946 to 1950, he edited the CMO of the Ministry of Health's annual reports, and for ten years he edited the medical department of the Ministry of Education's annual reports. In 1940, Glover became president of the Epidemiological Section of the Royal Society of Medicine (RSM), London. He wrote an autobiography with the request that it only be published after his death.