Download Epidemic Disease Since the Black Death

From: Calliope, 2001-03
Issue Theme: The Black Death
Subject: Medicine, Health and Disease
Time Period: AD1000-1500: Medieval Times, 1750-1914: Age of Revolutions, 1900Present
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Epidemic Disease Since the Black Death
by Nick King
Although most of the epidemics associated with the Black Death occurred in the 1300s,
plague continued to threaten humans for centuries. Between 1664 and 1665, 70,000
people died during the Great Plague of London, and in 1894 plague killed up to 100,000
people in Canton (China) and Hong Kong before spreading to neighboring countries.
During the next 20 years, more than 10 million people worldwide died from the disease.
Although humans have developed strategies to prevent and treat the disease in the
intervening years, it remains a threat to human life even today. In 1994, outbreaks of
bubonic and pneumonic plague killed more than 200 people in India, reminding us that
the fight against infectious disease is far from over.
Plague is not the only disease to have threatened humanity in the 650 years since the
Black Death first swept across Europe. During this time, infectious diseases of all kinds
have wreaked death and destruction across the globe. Both the diseases themselves and
people’s experiences of them have varied greatly. Diseases are transmit- ted in a
number of ways: through the air in droplets of mucus from coughs or sneezes; from the
bites of animals such as mosquitoes, fleas, and rodents; or through direct contact with
microbes carried by water, blood, or other body fluids. Diseases such as Ebola
hemorrhagic fever and Anthrax are extremely deadly and cause sickness and death
very quickly. Others, such as HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis, may not cause sickness until
many years after infection. Diseases are caused by many different kinds of organisms,
including bacteria, viruses, protozoa (extremely small single-cell animals), and helminths
(multicellular animals such as tapeworms and roundworms).
Before the 20th century, disease was a constant companion for people the world over.
Asia and Western Europe were repeatedly struck by epidemics of not only plague, but
also cholera, influenza, smallpox, yellow fever, and childhood diseases such as measles
and chickenpox. Europeans exported many of these diseases to North and South
America between the 16th and 19th centuries. With little or no natural immunity to the
diseases that Europeans brought to their shores, as much as 90% of the Native
American population died in terrible epidemics of smallpox, measles, and typhus. In
Africa and South Asia, people suffered from tropical diseases such as malaria and
dengue. Sometimes local epidemics spread across the globe. Between 1817 and 1923,
cholera epidemics swept across Asia and Europe, killing thousands. In 1918 and 1919,
several strains of the Spanish influenza virus killed 675,000 people in the United States,
and between 20 and 25 million worldwide.
During the late 19th and 20th centuries, the situation began to change. In Western
Europe and North America, the number of deaths from infectious disease sharply
declined. In 1900, 797 out of every 100,000 people in the United States died from
infectious diseases; by 1980, only 36 out of every 100,000 did. During the same period,
the number of years that the average American could expect to live jumped from 47 to
73. However, the same cannot be said of the rest of the world. Diseases like pneumonia,
tuberculosis, and malaria have killed millions of people in Africa, Latin America, and Asia
throughout the 20th century, and continue to do so to this day.
There were several reasons for the decline in epidemic disease in richer countries like
the United States. Better nutrition and living conditions have improved people’s ability to
resist diseases. Advancements in public health, sanitation, and pest control and the
availability of clean water have all worked to hamper the transmission of infections via
insects and dirty water. Finally, the development of vaccines, antibiotics, and other
drugs have led to the cure or even eradication of diseases like polio and smallpox.
Still, infectious disease is not yet a phenomenon of the past. Since the early 1980s, the
HIV/AIDS epidemic has grown to staggering proportions. Worldwide, 47 million people
have been infected with the HIV virus and almost 20 million people have died from the
epidemic. In 1999 alone, 2.8 million people, mostly in Africa and Southeast Asia, died of
AIDS. You have also probably heard of several high-profile microbes like the Ebola and
West Nile viruses, each of which has caused deaths in the United States and elsewhere.
Although there have been many changes since the time of the Black Death, a few factors
have always been true during epidemics. Disease tends to strike hardest at the poorest
and most disadvantaged members of a society. Weakened by bad nutrition and lack of
access to health care, the poor are less resistant to disease and unable to afford proper
care when they become sick.
People the world over also still respond to epidemics in many different ways. They rely
on doctors and scientists, but also religious and political leaders, to provide explanations
for what causes disease and how to prevent and cure it. Despite numerous advances in
the treatment and prevention of epidemic disease, it continues to be a source of fear and
suffering for people around the globe.
Hemorrhagic refers to heavy bleeding.
Anthrax is an infectious hemorrhagic disease of wild and domesticated animals,
especially cattle and sheep, which is caused by a bacillus and can be transmitted to
people.
Dengue is an infectious tropical disease transmitted by mosquitoes and characterized by
severe pains in the joints and back, fever, and rash.
See also:
Articles from the same subject.
Articles from the same time period.
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