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Are you saying that syphilis was widespread among native Americans? Post aside, that is a fascinating fact.
by Rotdhizon 8y ago
Are you saying that syphilis was widespread among native Americans? Post aside, that is a fascinating fact.
- rb808 8y agoLooks likely but not proven. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syphilis#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syphilis#History It is interesting. It was terrible that early explorers carried diseases that killed millions in the regions they went to. Its reassuringly symmetric that diseases went the other way as well. I didn't know that 100k+ still die from it every year.
- Maultasche 8y agoYes, syphilis was first noticed when it started to spread around Europe in the 1490s not long after sustained contact with the Americas. So it's likely that it did come from the Americas, but it hasn't been proven. It's also possible that it coincidentally originated in Europe around the same time and spread to the Americas. By the time people started looking into where it had come from, it was widespread in both places and the exact origins were obscure. Nobody appears to have recorded the prevalence of syphilis in the Americas during the early years of European contact.
- ams6110 8y agoWhether it was or wasn't, there's no real reason not to think that each population transmitted diseases to the other, who lacked natural or acquired immunity.