It hasn’t disappeared. It’s still exists, it’s just that if you get it modern antibiotics can kill it.
You still have a 5-15% chance of dying with modern antibiotics.
It’s the improvement in sanitary practices that ultimately made it a much lesser issue.
And the virus evolved to be less deadly and people evolved to have better immune responses to it.
The “Spanish Flu” still exists, and is all around us. Endemic to humanity. Meaning the H1N1-subtype of the influenza virus. Which killed 50-100 million people in 1918-1920. (Nowadays it’s called the seasonal flu)
I’d like to find an image of anti-antivaxxers, from around that time. They had some good burns against the silly antivaxxers and I just can’t remember what they were.
Those are two different things. The bubonic plague is a bacterial infection.
Oh yeah, I should’ve said “the disease” but I was already talking about flu epidemics in my head.
Good note, thanks, but for other people, as I understand the difference very well and would never suggest antibiotics as a treatment to virus-borne disease. And the evolution of bacteria is very different from viruses. Hell, we haven’t even decided if viruses are technically living or not. Anyway, good point
The word “quarantine” originates from a Venetian policy that every single ship had to wait outside of port for 40 days to ensure nobody had the plague. I’m sure the antivax people would have no problem with such measures?
Also it hasn’t disappeared. You can friggin catch it right now if you want
Gotta catch m all
It didn’t disappear btw. The black death wasn’t 1 round of disease that killed everyone. There were waves of it and the big one in Europe wasn’t the first or last deadly outbreak. It is still around but thanks to antibiotics it is mostly a non issue.
When I was stationed in Colorado, we were doing our exercise in an open field of grass, rolling around, doing push-ups and sit-ups etc, when someone ran up and told the person running the formation that we needed to move because plague had been discovered in the prairie dog droppings all over the base, just like the ones we were apparently rolling around in
Fun times
How did it only kill 1/3, did many people survive it?
In addition to what the other commenter said, there’s some luck of the draw, too. There were three forms of it, having to do with how you were infected. Bubonic was one, associated with sores and boils on the skin, caused by flea bites. Pnumonic was a lung infection, which could spread directly via droplets. And septemic was the blood infection version, usually happening as one of the others progressed.
Bubonic only killed about 40-60% of those who showed symptoms, while pnumonic and septemic killed 90-100% of those who showed symptoms.
So to get infected at all, you needed either to be bitten by an infected flea, share air with someone who has pnumonic, or share fluids with someone that has bubonic (specifically the pus from the sores) or septemic (the blood, though maybe other fluids too).
Some managed to avoid these entirely. Others could have had lower exposures to the point where they didn’t develop symptoms. If someone gets infected but the infection doesn’t get established enough to become stable, they often don’t get treated any differently from people who weren’t infected at all. Those death rates only apply to those that they knew had it (though sometimes death rates are given per population rather than infected, and those tended to vary wildly in infected areas, from like 50% to 80%).
With viruses, at least, asymptomatic infection seems to be far more common than we would have thought. Both ebola and covid antibody studies showed that the antibodies were found in many who never got sick, implying they were exposed but their immune system beat it before symptoms showed up.
Bacteria isn’t necessarily the same, but it’s possible that something like this is a factor and those might have even developed some immunity. Plus, natural selection would select for people who are just less susceptible to it while it’s out there killing off a significant part of the population.
Some people didn’t get it and some had the right genes to fight off the disease. Those genes have now been linked to autoimmune diseases https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/genes-protective-during-the-black-death-may-now-be-increasing-autoimmune-disorders-202212012859
Also, the Black Plague has not been eradicated. It still exists in small mammals such as gophers and rats, and a strain could potentially mutate to humans again, although changes in human hygiene have made blood to blood infections less common.
The reason it seemed to disappear is because the more infectious and fatal strains spread to and killed off every susceptible human at a rate that could not support its propagation to new healthy humans.
It actually still exists in people too, it’s just rare and treatable with antibiotics.
https://www.healthline.com/health-news/seriously-dont-worry-about-the-plague
Plague: Then vs now
It’s rare because we have higher hygiene standards. Basically washing our hands eliminated the black plague.
I’m just going to Edit this comment because I don’t feel the need to explain to every idiot commenting “ACKSTUALLY.”
My comment was an over simplification. By having higher hygiene standards we reduced our contact with rats and other things that can carry it. It is essentially “We did A, which caused B through G, which lead to less of H.” If you don’t understand or see the connection then that isn’t my fault, blame your education.More like fleas and other biting insects are more rare, and people generally do not tolerate sleeping around non-pet rats. It’s more living conditions than hygene.
Basically washing our hands eliminated the black plague.
That’s not how it was spread, not really. It was spread by fleas and other blood to blood contact if the person had the bubonic plague and, in later stages, through the air in close contact via infectious respiratory droplets if the person had the pneumonic plague.
My comment was an over simplification. By having higher hygiene standards we reduced our contact with rats and other things that can carry it. It is essentially “We did A, which caused B through G, which lead to less of H.”
Your comment was partially incorrect. I corrected you. While it was a matter of hygiene, washing hands had little to nothing to do with it. You didn’t mention anything about rats or the fleas they carried, which were the primary carrier of the bubonic plague
I implore you to understand what an over simplification statement mean in regard to a multi step process that took centuries of understanding what to do and not to do. What conditions are considered acceptable now vs 700 years ago and so on.
An oversimplification doesn’t mean you get to make completely false statements. An oversimplification ignores other significant factors to end up with a simple statement that for the most part is true.
It’s rare because we have higher hygiene standards
This is an acceptable oversimplification.
Basically washing our hands eliminated the black plague.
This is not because this is just factually wrong.
The latter is what is being corrected. Now apply your smartass education and understand when you’re wrong.
In an era of anti-vax bullshit, it’s not acceptable to be that incorrect in your “oversimplification”.
I understand what “oversimplification” means. You do not seem to understand what “incorrect“ means.
Hygiene literally means practices that maintain health. Saying “we are healthy by maintaining better hygiene” literally means “We maintained our health by engaging in practices that maintained our health.”
Got a rodent problem? Just wash your hands!
Sure would have been nice to know this when my house got invested with fleas. No need to flea bomb, I just needed to wash my hands!
(got a pup from a household with inadequate flea control measures–they’d give him a flea bath weekly, but never treated the environment or their cats. They swore up and down he didn’t have fleas.)
I take it you just have the pup, so this tip might be for any cat owners passing by:
I’ve found to treat cats for fleas the best method is a flea comb and a tub of very bubbly soapy water.
The cat doesn’t go in the water, instead you sit the cat on your lap, comb it’s fur gently with the flea comb, and when you spot a flea on the comb, you dunk it in the bubbly soapy water.
…the slimey soapy bubbles capture the fleas, and make it a lot harder for them to escape. Turns a traumatic soggy moggy time, into a nice gentle combing kill session.
I assume you mean well, but this is serious “confidently incorrect” energy. Yersinia pestis, the bacteria that causes bubonic plague, never changed to become less virulent and can still affect humans to this day. It has been killing a ton of humans for thousands of years and was still killing thousands of people at a time in localized outbreaks up until we discovered the antibiotics that cure it.
Also, it’s transmitted through the fleas on small mammals, not through the mammals themselves. Flea transmission is far and away the primary vector. Human to human transmission has always been pretty rare, since it can only be transmitted between humans through contact with bodily fluids, similar to how HIV spreads.
the more infectious and fatal strains spread to and killed off every susceptible human at a rate that could not support its propagation to new healthy humans
Plague Inc. has taught me how to be more effective and prevent this from happening.
Evolve Necrosis FTW. Gotta have corpse-to-living tx. The real problem with plague inc. is the motivation though the disease is likely dead one turn after humanity.
This is where we need a conspiracy theory that all complex life is just an intricate biological shell/animate castle-o-saurus, designed to protect and nourish a few self replicating acids, with defense mechanisms to try to kill any interlopers that seek to replicate faster without dissuading anything sexually compatible.
Sounds like the novel Parasite Eve which inspired a movie and later videogame series. Basically it piggy backs on the concept of Mitochondrial Eve wherein Mitocondria evolved separately from all other cellular life and exists as a symbiotic organism.
Also it didn’t disappear?
These people are just willfully ignorant and deeply faithful.
“One death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic.”
These people would care more if they personally get hurt.
That why a rhetorical tool that personalizes death may work.
Something like “okay, your mother is now dead. And now your wife, and auntie and even your old highschool girlfriend. You watch them all die, bewildered and distraught, but you do nothing until your son dies in front of you, choking on a resporator, pleading in his eyes until the very end.”
“You can stop the rest of your family dying right now right now, right way. you can even save your own life, in a way that will also save other peoples mothers, wifes, and sons. Will you?”
Let me tell you about my mother.
Well, you aint gonna win them all, but something like the above tends to work when people talk about how “some people” should die or go somewhere else. Bringing it back from “somebody” to “you and everyone you know” tends to shock that talk out of them.
Oh I’m just referencing blade runner.
Your story really reminds me of the Voight-Kampff test.
Its effectivly an empathy test just like voight-kampff, so I see where you’re coming from.
Capillary dilation of the so-called blush response? Fluctuation of the pupil. Involuntary dilation of the iris…
depending on the person, one death could also be a party
Doesn’t have to be one, I’ve made a list
Oh I am partying once Trump keels over. Absolutely no shame admitting that.
It did not cause imaginary autism though.
The black plague is common in Madagascar for example, in villages which can’t be reqxhes without a helicopter and people there have no money for antibiotics. So doctors without borders are doing there best, but it’s still there (among other places). The vaccine for spreading misinformation is education, but sadly people prefer to get their knowledge from tiktok while letting AI do their school work, if they go to school at all.
So sick of seeing confidently incorrect people opining, using historical examples, when they have never before cracked open a history book and have no idea of the context.
So sick of seeing confidently incorrect people opining, using historical examples, when they have never before cracked open a history book and have no idea of the context.
This has always been the case through history.
The issue is Twitter boosts them over less engaging experts. The new problem is the medium. Twitter is not a fair forum, and these takes trend deliberately.
…And I think its really important for scientists (or anyone who believes in science) to recognize that. With all due respect, I do not understand, with everything that’s happened, why they still keep using Twitter.
Legitimately, what else would they use? Hardly anyone uses Mastodon - I don’t for sure, but from what I hear, the devs continually ignore the needs that people keep asking about. Which is why so many turned to Bluesky - it works.
To discuss the Threadiverse that I am much more familiar with, literally 100% of the people that I’ve told about “Lemmy” have outright chided me for having told them about it. (1) If you Google’d that term (not DuckDuckGo, I’m talking mainstream normies here) a year ago, it would take you to lemmy.ml; (2) that instance by default does not show All, but rather Local; (3) lemmy.ml - along with lemmygrad.ml and hexbear.net - routinely calls for the murder of everyone participating in a capitalist, Western society (Edit: not just billionaires, or even millionaires, but anyone who participates). And showing Local rather than All does not dilute that flood as much as you see your view of the Threadiverse content from lemmy.world. (4) no major Lemmy instances defederate from lemmy.ml (quokk.au did iirc, before it switched all the way over to PieFed).
There are some MAJOR structural issues with the Fediverse that need to be solved first, before mainstream normies - who remember are primarily centrist (aka liberal to even right-wing by the standards here) - will feel comfortable here. Not celebrating and calling for their literal irl murder might be a start. (Note that while YOU might have such communities and user accounts blocked, a guest account, especially browsing lemmy.ml, cannot and would not know how to deal with such - e.g. a new account on most instances could respond to comments in [email protected] while browsing All and have no idea what they are walking into… then noping out and worst of all, telling everyone that will listen how extremist we are here)
We are a Nazi bar here, except instead of Nazis it’s tankies. Also, purity beatings will continue until morale improves. Mainstream people do not feel welcomed here. And most people seem unable to even say so much as they should be? Would you want more “right-wing” people here? (I actually mean centrists, but especially in the USA where so many are located, that is more where they would lean, right?)
Edit: so to answer your question, they use Xhitter the same way that we use the Threadiverse - by blocking early and blocking often, and putting up with what the remainder of stuff that they do not like, in order to make some use of what is freely offered to them, especially requiring minimal efforts to overcome their existing inertia.
Henry Ford believed the Elders of Zion, and he was a cultural icon in business, which I assume meant he was top tier intelligent at the time.
The Black Plague was truly a horror, but it DID break the back of Catholicism in Europe, so that’s nice. Every cloud has a silver lining
It broke feudalism, too, and kickstarted the renaissance.
How so? Didn’t Luther do that a couple hundred years later?
At the time of the plague, the Catholic church dominated every state politically; they were the undisputed masters of Europe.
After the plague, they never recovered the same amount of control again. This was the start of a long decline that continues to this day. The plague revealed how truly ineffectual and predatory the church was, even to the most ignorant.
Recommend the books The Black Death and The Dancing Plague, I’m over simplifying of course there are many other details.
So what youre saying is it was gods will for the church to decline and it was done via the plague which must have come from God if everything is part of God’s plan, which means God wanted fewer followers and eventually have none?
PRECISELY
Which black death book? There are many and I’d like to learn.
I’m assuming dancing plague is John Waller?
My memory fails me, here’s what I have found on my bookshelf from the last few years
The Great Mortality: An Intimate History of the Black Death, the Most Devastating Plague of All Time by Kelly
The Dancing Plague: The Strange, True Story of an Extraordinary Illness by Waller
The Black Death 1346-1353: The Complete History by Benedictow
that continues to this day.
The US disagrees as do some theocratic states like Iran (nit-pick but i said catholic all you want, they all look the same to me).
THE GOOD NEWS The last time I looked, they’re all shrinking in membership.
Also, remember, they have always lied about their predominance, and they always will. Abrahamics have no relationship with the truth, don’t ever listen to them and their claims, believe nothing without solid evidence from another source.
Do not mistake the bullshit narrative of the oligarchs with actual human beings. Religion is dying everywhere amongst actual human beings.
It also killed between 10% and 100% (average of a 3rd or so) of populated areas every 10 years for about 600 years. So ~3x longer than the US has been around.
But I assume that nobody at the time had autism, because they were not vaccinated. Worth it!/s
That’s because Tylenol didn’t exist yet
#prodeath
It did not disappear. It’s still posting on social media.
Kind of rude to talk about Kanye like that
I worked at a zoo for a bit and whenever we went in the prairie dogs enclosure we had to wear lowkey hazmat and fully sanitize before & after bc they can carry it
