That they had more germs not sure about, my take on the germs part has always been the same thing you have with any invasive species in a new environment. It is

That they had more germs not sure about, my take on the germs part has always been the same thing you have with any invasive species in a new environment. It is mathematically easier for them to spread their germs to indigenous population There was one major disease Europeans brought back from the Americas: syphilis. Otherwise, the raft of diseases Europeans brought to the Americas (which devastated the indigenous populations) can be specifically traced back to animal husbandry. The intensity of Europeans’ relationship to domestic animals plus all of the wild animals living in urban areas in close proximity to humans (such as rats) is what led to Europeans being potential carriers of so many diseases. You simply get way more disease exposure from farming (cattle, pigs, goats, sheep, poultry) and living in cities (rats, mice, cats, dogs, bats, insects) than you do in small hunting or fishing villages. So the germs axis is part of Diamond’s geography argument. Proximity to domesticable animals and cereal grains leads to more exposure to disease, greater concentrations of population, and therefore devastating plagues. Those who survived the plagues had the potential to be asymptomatic carriers who would eventually bring destruction to the indigenous people of the Americas.