Posted on 03/16/2021 9:41:15 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
New bioarchaeological research shows malaria has threatened human communities for more than 7000 years, earlier than when the onset of farming was thought to have sparked its devastating arrival...
"Until now we've believed malaria became a global threat to humans when we turned to farming, but our research shows in at least Southeast Asia this disease was a threat to human groups well before that.
"This research providing a new cornerstone of malaria's evolution with humans is a great achievement by the entire team," Dr Vlok says...
While malaria is invisible in the archaeological record, the disease has changed the evolutionary history of human groups causing consequences visible in prehistoric skeletons. Certain genetic mutations can lead to the inheritance of Thalassemia, a devasting genetic disease that in its milder form provides some protection against malaria.
Deep in humanity's past, the genes for malaria became more common in Southeast Asia and the Pacific where it remains a threat, but up until now the origin of malaria has not been pinpointed. This research has identified thalassemia in an ancient hunter-gatherer archaeological site from Vietnam dated to approximately 7000 years ago, thousands of years before the transition to farming in the region.
In some parts of the world, slashing and burning in agricultural practice would have created pools of stagnant water attracting mosquitos carrying malaria, but in Southeast Asia these mosquitos are common forest dwellers exposing humans to the disease long before agriculture was adopted.
(Excerpt) Read more at eurekalert.org ...
Forager and farmer evolutionary adaptations to malaria evidenced by 7000 years of thalassemia in Southeast Asia
Melandri Vlok, Hallie R. Buckley, Justyna J. Miszkiewicz, Meg M. Walker, Kate Domett, Anna Willis, Hiep H. Trinh, Tran T. Minh, Mai Huong T. Nguyen, Lan Cuong Nguyen, Hirofumi Matsumura, Tianyi Wang, Huu T. Nghia & Marc F. Oxenham
Scientific Reports volume 11, Article number: 5677 (2021)
Now I don’t want this should scare ya,
But my bunk mate has malaria.
HCQ is a cure for malaria. It’s been used for over 7 decades.
It is currently one of the top 100 most prescribed drugs in the world.
Has anyone of these brilliant government scientists thought to do a database search, to find out if any of them caught COVID...?
I think I stayed in that camp!
The lake has alligators.
People 7000 years ago should have worn masks. Then the mosquitoes would have stayed away.
I have thalassemia minor. My blood work up is nasty looking.
Schistocyte,Ovalocyte,Microcyte,Dacryocyte etc
Getting physicians to understand how thalassemia can have an effect on all kinds of things is a mind numbing and frustrating experience.
It is not well understood in the US.
Understood better in Italy.
Since they reportedly found substances useful to control the symptoms of malaria with Tut I think it may have been a bit much to say “While malaria is invisible in the archaeological record”.
Given all the looted tombs how much other archaeological evidence of malaria striking the powerful in Egypt was lost? And therefore evidence for it affecting others?
You mean, white men didn’t deliberately bring it to the New World, after all? /s
ddt IS A powerful deterrent to malaria
pity it isn’t used now.
I wonder if the searching party found Jeffrey Hardy?
Mans ability to understand chemistry and apply it has allowed the species to flourish and stall the inevitable.
Sorry to hear that, but a good reason to visit Italy. :^)
Never heard about it before so I read the wiki article on it. Interesting how disease like malaria can select for what would otherwise be a genetic ‘defect’ in a way that without the Thalassemia would have been an advantageous adaptation.
Did Malaria, Bone Disease Kill King Tut?
DNA Analysis of Mummy Yields New Clues to Pharaoh’s Death
By Bill Hendrick
Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD on February 16, 2010
https://www.webmd.com/children/news/20100216/did-malaria-bone-disease-kill-king-tut
Loved the smell of DDT in the evening!
Thank you, SC, for your posts. They are of very high quality and serve as a breath of fresh air in today’s WOKE era.
The older I get, the more I appreciate them. Bravo!
Human remains dating back 14,000 years have been found in Alaska that show evidence of tuberculosis. Many diseases have been infesting humans for a LONG time.
/Obligatory FU Rachael Carson!!! rant.
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