Virgin soil epidemic

Virgin soil epidemic is a term coined by Alfred Crosby, [1] defining it as epidemics "in which the populations at risk have had no previous contact with the diseases that strike them and are therefore immunologically almost defenseless." The concept is related to that developed by William McNeill in which he connected the development of agriculture and more sedentary life with the emergence of new diseases as microbes moved from domestic animals to humans.[2] Virgin soil epidemics have occurred with European colonization, particularly during the Age of Discovery, when European explorers and colonialists brought diseases to "New World" lands in the Americas, Australia and Pacific Islands.[3] This concept would later be adopted wholesale by Jared Diamond as a central theme in his popular book Guns, Germs and Steel as an explanation for successful European expansion.

When a population has not had contact with a particular pathogen, individuals in that population have not built up any immunity to that organism, and have not received immunity passed from mother to child.[4] Epidemiologist Francis Black has suggested that some isolated populations may not have mixed enough to become as genetically heterogeneous as their colonizers, which would also have affected their natural immunity.[4] Consequently when a previously unknown disease is introduced to such a population, there is an increase in the morbidity and mortality rates; historically this increase has often been devastating, and always noticeable.[3]

Diseases introduced to the Americas by European colonizers—and their African slaves—include smallpox, yellow fever, measles and malaria, as well as new strains of typhus and influenza.[1][5]

Virgin soil epidemics also occurred in the Old World prior to the Age of Discovery. For example, the Romans spread smallpox through new populations in Europe and the Middle East in the 2nd century AD, and the Mongols brought the bubonic plague to Europe and the Middle East in the 14th century.[5]

See also

References

Footnotes
  1. 1 2 Crosby, Alfred W. (1976), "Virgin Soil Epidemics as a Factor in the Aboriginal Depopulation in America", The William and Mary Quarterly, Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, 33 (2), pp. 289–299, JSTOR 1922166
  2. ↑ McNeill, William H. (1976), Plagues and Peoples, Anchor Press, ISBN 978-0385121224
  3. 1 2 Cliff et al, p. 120
  4. 1 2 Hays, p. 87
  5. 1 2 Alchon, p. 80
Bibliography
  • Alchon, Suzanne Austin (2003), A Pest in the Land: New World Epidemics in a Global Perspective, University of New Mexico Press, ISBN 0-8263-2871-7 
  • Cliff, Andrew David; Haggett, Peter; Smallman-Raynor, Matthew (2000), Island Epidemics, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-828895-6 
  • Hays, J. N. (2005), Epidemics and Pandemics: Their Impacts on Human History, ABC-CLIO, ISBN 1-85109-658-2 
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