Let's talk about historical plagues. I've been fascinated by how society changes when disease is rampant and of course, how their conception and treatment has changed over the years. I've been very interested lately in the theory many ancient epidemics might even have been diseases that no longer exist or that we haven't really encountered again, like for example that the plague of Athens was a now-unknown viral hemorragic fever.
> dancing plague
Truly the worst of them all
What about the irish potato famine?
>>1178405
I suppose it was a horrible plague for the potatoes, the blight is still a problem even for modern farms.
>>1178405
>Grow enough potatoes for your family to eat and nothing more
>Landlords still force you to give them all of it to sell in England
>Decide to fish for food
>jk the British have made it illegal for the Irish to do so
>Turks of all "people" decide to send food to help you and your people
>British queen tells them not to since they're being more charitable than her
>They sneak it in anyway
The only plague was the English
>>1178390
This shit was weird, and even more so the fact there were many outbreaks separated by years. Has it ever gotten a credible explanation that doesn't rely on memes like "mass hysteria"?
>>1178445
>Visit the island next to yours
>The fucking Irish are everywhere
The only plague was the Irish
>>1178367
>I've been very interested lately in the theory many ancient epidemics might even have been diseases that no longer exist or that we haven't really encountered again, like for example that the plague of Athens was a now-unknown viral hemorragic fever.
This seems pretty likely, new diseases come and go all the time as our own beloved ebola-chan shows.
>>1178405
>>1178419
90% of the potatoes in Ireland came from a single original potato, so when a strain of the common potato blight appeared that grew especially well in just such potatoes, it spread very rapidly and wiped out a huge part of the crop. Nothing like it is likely to happen again, in Ireland or anywhere else, since modern farmers grow multiple strains of potatoes with different resistances to the various forms of potato blight.
>>1178475
the soil gets turned now too and and a break every few seasons
>nice copypasta reddit/10
We have over 5 Hitler threads at any moment and you're letting an interesting topic die? Come on, /his/.
>>1178367
Bubonic plague exists today, even in the USA. We just know exactly what to do with it, with the advent of antibiotics.
>>1178468
Ebola isn't "new." It's been around for a very long time.
>>1178453
A time traveler dumped a bunch of ecstasy in the well.
>>1179689
>>1179694
These are both true, and
>>1178367
>diseases that no longer exist or that we haven't really encountered again
There's no way to know this, really. Different people have different physical reactions to any manner of pathogens, for a variety of reasons. It's possible some tragic sicknesses were very simple but the reports were based on the reactions of a few, or a few with suppressed immunity, or a combination of ailments, as a pathogen plus the effects of lead or arsenic poisoning. You'd need to have the actual remains studied by a pathologist to be able to make specific statements as this.
It's fairly unlikely that we would encounter any historical plagues that we are not currently aware of due to all the hosts having died off. That being said we can never be too sure about what might be lurking in other primate populations.
>>1180206
because... we only share pathogens with other primates? Somebody should have told that to smallpox and yersinia.
>>1178367
>Historical plagues
As opposed to upcoming ones?
>>1179689
The plague still exists, but not in Europe. It disappeared there before we learned how to treat it, during the 1700s.
