It was the summer of 1793 and a ghastly epidemic of Yellow fever gripped the largest city of America and the nation’s capital. Samuel Breck, a newly arrived merchant to Philadelphia and later instructor to the blind, observed “the horrors of this memorable affliction were extensive and heart rending.” Samuel Breck estimated that the number of deaths in 1793 by yellow fever was more than four thousand. Modern scholars estimate the number to be closer to five thousand, a tenth of the capital’s fifty thousand residents. However, twenty thousand people, including Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and much of the federal government had fled the city to escape the fever thereby making proportion of deaths among those who remained quite high. What could cause such a devastating epidemic to occur on Pennsylvania soil?
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The Pennsylvania Center for the Book - Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 - 1 views
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Yellow fever is an acute, infectious, hemorrhagic (bleeding) viral disease transmitted by the bite of a female mosquito native to tropical and subtropical regions of South America and Africa. However, it wasn’t discovered that Yellow Fever was transmitted by mosquitoes until 1881. At the time, Yellow Fever was a well known illness that affected sailors who travelled to the Caribbean and Africa characterized by disquieting color changes including yellow eyes and skin, purple blotches under the skin from internal bleeding and hemorrhages, and black stools and vomit, all of which were accompanied by a high fever.
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In 1793, people of the French Caribbean colony of Saint Domingue (now Haiti) were fleeing a revolution from France and thousands of infected individuals landed at the Philadelphia docks. This combined with the dry, hot summer and low water tables of 1793 created the perfect breeding grounds for mosquitoes and the spread of Yellow Fever.
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Good facts of the History of Yellow fever
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the helpers of the virus.
The Black Death, 1348 - 3 views
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"The symptoms were not the same as in the East, where a gush of blood from the nose was the plain sign of inevitable death; but it began both in men and women with certain swellings in the groin or under the armpit. They grew to the size of a small apple or an egg, more or less, and were vulgarly called tumours. In a short space of time these tumours spread from the two parts named all over the body. Soon after this the symptoms changed and black or purple spots appeared on the arms or thighs or any other part of the body, sometimes a few large ones, sometimes many little ones. These spots were a certain sign of death, just as the original tumour had been and still remained.
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Some thought that moderate living and the avoidance of all superfluity would preserve them from the epidemic. They formed small communities, living entirely separate from everybody else. They shut themselves up in houses where there were no sick, eating the finest food and drinking the best wine very temperately, avoiding all excess, allowing no news or discussion of death and sickness, and passing the time in music and suchlike pleasures. Others thought just the opposite. They thought the sure cure for the plague was to drink and be merry, to go about singing and amusing themselves, satisfying every appetite they could, laughing and jesting at what happened.
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what people would do to avoid the disease and things that would happen if to get the plague
Black Death - 0 views
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Black Death Victims in the Middle Ages - TreatmentsThe Black Death victims in the Middle Ages were terrified of the deadly disease. The plague held a massive mortality rate between 30 and 40%. Victims had no idea what had caused the disease. Neither did the physicians in the Middle Ages. The most that could be done was that various concoctions of herbs might be administered to relieve the symptoms - there was no known cure. Headaches were relieved by rose, lavender, sage and bay. Sickness or nausea was treated with wormwood, mint, and balm. Lung problems were treated with liquorice and comfrey. Vinegar was used as a cleansing agent as it was believed that it would kill disease. But bloodletting was commonly thought to be one of the best ways to treat the plague. The blood that exuded was black, thick and vile smelling with a greenish scum mixed in it.Black Death Treatment: Black Death was treated by lancing the buboes and applying a warm poultice of butter, onion and garlic. Various other remedies were tried including arsenic, lily root and even dried toad. During a later outbreak of this terrible plague, during the Elizabethan era, substances such as tobacco brought from the New World were also used in experiments to treat the disease.
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Black Death in England - 1348-1350 The Black Death reached England in 1348. Bristol was an important European port and city in England during the Medieval era. It is widely believed that Bristol was the place where the Black Death first reached England. The plague reached England during the summer months between June and August. The Back Death reached London by 1st November 1348. London was a crowded, bustling city with a population of around 70,000. The sanitation in London was poor and living conditions were filthy. The River Thames brought more ships and infection to London which spread to the rest of England. The crowded, dirty living conditions of the English cities led to the rapid spread of the disease. Church records that the actual deaths in London were approximately 20,000. Between 1348 and 1350, killed about 30 - 40% of the population of England which at the time was estimated to be about five to six million. Many people were thrown into open communal pits. The oldest, youngest and poorest died first. Whole villages and towns in England simply ceased to exist after the Black Death.
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The Black Death and ReligionDuring the Middle Ages it was essential that people were given the last rites and had the chance to confess their sins before they died. The spread of the deadly plague in England was swift and the death rate was almost 50% in isolated populations such as monasteries. There were not enough clergy to offer the last rites or give support and help to the victims. The situation was so bad that Pope Clement VI was forced to grant remission of sins to all who died of the Black Death. Victims were allowed to confess their sins to one another, or "even to a woman". The church could offer no reason for the deadly disease and beliefs were sorely tested. This had such a devastating effect that people started to question religion and such doubts ultimately led to the English reformation.
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