Giuseppe
Emeritus
Body Lice, Yersinia pestis Orientalis, and Black Death (Emerg Infect Dis., letter, excerpt, edited)
[Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, full text: <cite cite="http://www.cdc.gov/eid/content/16/10/1649.htm">Body Lice, Yersinia pestis Orientalis, and Black Death | CDC EID</cite>. Extract, edited.]
Volume 16, Number 10?October 2010
Letter
Body Lice, Yersinia pestis Orientalis, and Black Death
To the Editor:
A scientific debate with public health implications wages: What caused the medieval European plague epidemics known as Black Death? Recent articles note inconsistencies between a rat flea?borne pandemic of Yersinia pestis (the bacterium that causes bubonic plague) and the documented characteristics of Black Death (1, among others). Ayyadurai et al. (2) acknowledge that a rat flea?only hypothesis does not fit Black Death observations, but they resolve theoretical transmission inconsistencies through a louse-borne hypothesis. Ayyadurai et al. base their surety of fact?that medieval ?plagues? were caused by Y. pestis infection?on a 2007 study (3) in which 5 of 36 teeth of ?plague? victims, none of which were dated to the Black Death era (1347?1351), contained biological evidence of Y. pestis. The 3 locations in that study were all port cities: 2 on the Mediterranean Sea and 1 on the Rhone River. As Duncan and Scott (4) note, bubonic plague most likely existed endemically near ship-borne trade, unlike the fast-moving epidemic fronts exhibited by medieval ?plagues.? Moreover, Gilbert et al. (5) found no Y. pestis DNA in 61 skeletons from primarily nonport locations in England, France, and Denmark.
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[Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, full text: <cite cite="http://www.cdc.gov/eid/content/16/10/1649.htm">Body Lice, Yersinia pestis Orientalis, and Black Death | CDC EID</cite>. Extract, edited.]
Volume 16, Number 10?October 2010
Letter
Body Lice, Yersinia pestis Orientalis, and Black Death
To the Editor:
A scientific debate with public health implications wages: What caused the medieval European plague epidemics known as Black Death? Recent articles note inconsistencies between a rat flea?borne pandemic of Yersinia pestis (the bacterium that causes bubonic plague) and the documented characteristics of Black Death (1, among others). Ayyadurai et al. (2) acknowledge that a rat flea?only hypothesis does not fit Black Death observations, but they resolve theoretical transmission inconsistencies through a louse-borne hypothesis. Ayyadurai et al. base their surety of fact?that medieval ?plagues? were caused by Y. pestis infection?on a 2007 study (3) in which 5 of 36 teeth of ?plague? victims, none of which were dated to the Black Death era (1347?1351), contained biological evidence of Y. pestis. The 3 locations in that study were all port cities: 2 on the Mediterranean Sea and 1 on the Rhone River. As Duncan and Scott (4) note, bubonic plague most likely existed endemically near ship-borne trade, unlike the fast-moving epidemic fronts exhibited by medieval ?plagues.? Moreover, Gilbert et al. (5) found no Y. pestis DNA in 61 skeletons from primarily nonport locations in England, France, and Denmark.
(...)
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