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The ancient Maya  perceived health as “balance”, whereas illness and disease were “imbalance”. Balance, however, was influenced by season and varied by age, gender, personality and exposure to environmental temperature extremes. A central medical-related theme held that balance was effected favorably or adversely by diet.

Most recently, scientists have turned their work towards the possibility of disease. The climate was humid and would have supported a host of parasitic activity. As the Mayan civilization grew and spread, disturbances would have occurred which could have placed the people in contact with parasites that would promote disease and death. If this were the case no member of the Mayans would have been spared. As with many diseases that attacked the human body, death can be a slow process dependent upon the strength and health of the individual attacked.

the Maya equated sickness with the captivity of one’s soul by supernatural beings, angered by some perceived misbehavior

A hemorrhagic fever, which was called Cocoliztli,

Two epidemics of Cocoliztli, occurring in 1545 and 1576 respectively, killed a total of 13 million people.

Symptoms ranged from headache and fever to dementia, nodule formation, and bleeding from all orifices before eventual death. Interestingly, the more severe symptoms of Cocoliztli only affected the native inhabitants of Mesoamerica;

The causes for the Maya's decline are numerous, but one of the central causes is that the demands they placed upon their environment grew beyond the capacity of the land. At it's peak, there were about 15 million people occupying the Mayan world. Over-population of Mayan metropolises are suspected to have gone beyond levels that the Mayan political and social networks were able to support, resulting in social unrest and revolution. Frequent skirmishes by warring clans, such as the Toltec invasion of Chichen Itza, are suspected to have forced the Mayan populace to flee their cities. Recent studies have discovered evidenc

of severe droughts, deforestation, and a decline in large game animals that began around 800 A.D., coinciding with a sharp drop in new construction. Human bones found from this time show signs of severe malnutrition, which would have been a driving factor behind raids. While Maya civilization did go through a brief renaissance after this period, ongoing environmental constraints played a large role in their eventual decline.