Treating Medieval Diseases In Modern Times
Many of you read my post on the state of America’s cities. I mentioned that diseases that were thought to be eradicated or very rare, are occurring more often. There have been countless articles about problems in the cities but I was unable to find any that addressed how to prevent and treat the diseases that are occurring or that may become a problem if conditions continue to be unhygienic.
Recently it was in the news that police officers and city workers in Los Angeles are being diagnosed with typhoid. This made me think that it is worth researching how to diagnose and treat diseases that used to be basically nonexistent in developed countries.
Regardless of how you feel about what
is going on in this country, or the causes of the massive
homelessness and despair in the nation’s cities, we now have a
situation where it could pay off to be aware of the treatment options
available.
I want you to have the knowledge to stay healthy or recover from an illness so I wrote this article.
Some of the diseases that I am going to
discuss here may not have caused trouble yet but I am fearful that we
are headed in that direction due to the extreme lack of hygiene and
sanitation.
Basically all of the antibiotics
I discuss in this post are available through Thomas Labs in the form
of fish antibiotics. Many of you already have some of these in your
medical kits. Of course I must tell you that I am not a medical
professional. If you choose to take antibiotics labeled for animals,
you are responsible for any issues that may arise.
Typhoid is spread through water and food that is contaminated with fecal matter. In the old days people did not always put outhouses in good places or maintain them. Houses that had indoor plumbing would often straight pipe waste into streams and rivers and it caused a lot of disease and illness. City workers in LA are forced to clean up a lot of waste products from those living on the streets, particularly in the Skid Row area and were exposed to typhoid.
While antibiotics can treat typhoid, some strains of the disease
have become resistant or completely non responsive to some drugs.
Treatment: azithromycin (Also known as a Z-Pack)
You can buy Azithromycin as a fish antibiotic. It has become the
widely used drug for typhoid because it is effective against all
known strains at the moment. Hopefully typhoid does not become
resistant to this drug since it is used for so many different
illnesses and widely prescribed.
Cholera was a common disease in the
past. It is a bacteria that attacks the small intestine. Cholera can
lead to dehydration quickly due to excessive vomiting and diarrhea.
Symptoms can occur as soon as a few hours after infection or take as
long as 5 days to appear.
A very concerning fact about cholera
is that someone can be a carrier and show no major symptoms or
illness. Cholera symptoms can be reduced through the use of some
antibiotics. Some mild cases, doctors choose to let run their course
as long as the patient can stay adequately hydrated.
Treatment: The
Center For Disease Control recommends doxycycline for the treatment
of cholera in adults and azithromycin for cholera treatment in
children and pregnant women. Trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole
(Bactrim) and ciprofloxacin are also effective against cholera.
Dysentery is spread through food and water that are contaminated
by fecal matter. The main symptom is severe diarrhea that may have
blood present.
Treatment
The antibiotic metranazidole is the
most commonly prescribed treatment for dysentery. This medication is
often sold under the brand name Flagyl. You can get it as a fish
antibiotic to keep in your medical kit.
There are several different types of plague. The one most people
have heard of is the Bubonic plague. Because all types could become
present given the right conditions, I am going to describe all of
them. Bubonic is the most likely but it is good to know about all of
them just in case.
This is the variety of plauge from which the other varieties can
form. It is most often caused when someone is bit by an infected
flea. Symptoms include fever, chills, headache, and swollen lymph
nodes. The bacteria multiplies in the lymph nodes and swelling can be
as large as a chicken egg.
Symptoms
include fever, chills, weakness, abdominal pain, and shock. Victims
may experience black skin where tissue is dying. This often occurs on
toes and fingers as well as the nose. Sometimes this form of plague
is a symptom of bubonic. One of the major differences is that
septicemic plague can be spread by handling an infected animal and
via bites from infected fleas.
This form of the plague can be transmitted person to person via inhaled droplets. Victims may have watery and bloody mucus and trouble breathing. Pneumonic plague can develop from bubonic and septicemic plague due to the bacteria entering the lungs. Preventing plague from developing to this degree is one of the reasonswhy it is so important to treat the bubonic form as early as possible. Pneumonic plague is extremely contagious. IT IS THE ONLY FORM TRANSMITTABLE DIRECTLY FROM PERSON TO PERSON.
Treatment of Plague: Plague is
extremely serious but treatable with antibiotics. Since it is so
serious, it is always recommended that you seek medical care from a
trained professional. Antibiotics are usually administered via IV and
then orally once improvement is seen in the patient. If you are in a
situation where there is absolutely no medical care available,
doxycycline or ciprofloxacin can be effective. Here
is a link to the Center for Disease Control Chart of recommended
antibiotics for plague in printable pdf form.
There are three types of typhus but they have similar symptoms
including fever, rash, headache, confusion, nausea, body aches, and
vomiting.
Typhus is rare in developed countries which is why it made
national news when people were diagnosed with it in Los Angeles. If
an area has poor sanitation services and enough people producing
garbage then you run the risk of a typhus outbreak. Los Angeles is
likely experiencing the epidemic form
Murine Typhus
This is a flea borne disease that thrives in areas where rats and
other rodents are a major problem. This version people often get
over without antibiotic treatment but it can still be a good idea to
take a course of them anyway.
Epidemic Typhus
This version of typhus is spread
through body lice. In medieval times this form of typhus was
responsible for millions of deaths.
Scrub Typhus
This variant of typhus is carried by
chiggers and is currently found in Southeast Asia. At the time of
this writing it is not a concern anywhere else.
Treatment: Doxycycline is the
standard antibiotic treatment for murine, epidemic, and scrub typhus.
When given early, it will quickly clear up a typhus infection.
All forms of typhus can develop into a much more severe disease
and lead to organ damage and death if left untreated. It is important
to start treatment as soon as possible!
There has been a lot in the news about measle and mump outbreaks. People are quick to start blaming this or that group as the root cause. I think the truth is probably a lot more complicated
Is it not possible that diseases are becoming resistant to vaccinations? Is it possible that it is a lot more complicated than just blaming people that do not vaccinate? Shouldn’t kids that get vaccinated be safe around kids that are contagious with measles? Is that not the point of a vaccine; that it will protect someone from getting a disease from someone that already has it?
I am not a doctor nor do I have any medical training but it does seem like since there are diseases and infections that become resistant to antibiotics that it is possible that a disease could mutate enough for vaccines to not work as effectively or even at all in some cases. That is a scary thing to consider but I think it is worth thinking about.
Measles is spread in the air via droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes. Measles symptoms include a dry cough, high fever, red and watery eyes, flat red spots on the body, and small raised bumps.
Treatment of Measles
Once someone gets measles, there is no
specific medication that works to cure it.
Ibuprofen or Acetaminophen for fever and pain
Since a high fever is one of the
symptoms, doctors recommend taking an over the counter non aspirin
pain reliever such as ibuprofen or acetaminophen. NEVER GIVE ASPIRIN
for measles to children or teens, even during the recovery period
when the worst has past. The risk of Reyes syndrome is high.
Vitamin A for symptom reduction
Vitamin A can help lessen the severity of the symptoms. If a doctor gives vitamin A to someone for measles it is in a large dose of 200,000 IU. You can get Vitamin A supplements at any drug store.
Vaccination of unvaccinated people within 72 hours of known
exposure
Some doctor’s say that if someone is
exposed to measles but has not been vaccinated, they can reduce the
odds of developing the condition or at least lessen the severity if
they received a vaccination within 72 hours of exposure.
A lot of those reading this have been vaccinated against mumps but
we are starting to see cases of mumps once again. The mumps vaccine
is one of the vaccines required to attend schools in the USA. Mumps
is a viral infection that leads to swelling of the salivary glands
that are near your ears. Besides swelling, victims often experience
pain while chewing and swallowing, headaches, and loss of appetite.
Mumps is very contagious for 9 days after symptoms first appear so
it is very important for those afflicted to be quarantined and avoid
contact with others, especially anyone that has not been vaccinated.
Treatment: Like measles, there is no specific drug that
will get rid of mumps. The condition must run it’s course. If someone
is suffering from mumps then they need to rest a lot, stay hydrated,
and take either ibuprofen or acetaminophen to help ease symptoms.
Cold compresses can also be soothing.
Before going to the doctor with mumps symptoms it is advised
that you call ahead because mumps is so contagious. This way you can
reduce the risk of spreading it to other people at the office. Do not
just walk into a clinic or emergency room unless you have no other
choice.
Good hygiene and sanitation practices are critical to preventing diseases. The main reason we are seeing a rise in old diseases is that the sanitation situation is closer to that found in the past when waste was thrown into the streets or straight piped into waterways.
When sanitation is low, rats and mice thrive which can lead to many of the diseases featured in this article.
The situation in Los Angeles, Seattle, and other major cities will
continue to get worse until something is done about the sanitation
and hygiene situation. That is a very hard problem when you have
homeless populations of 5,000 or more in many areas. Keep in mind
that is just the figures that the public has access to. The true
numbers could be much higher than that. It is impossible for the
average person to know this. In addition, the numbers are changing
every day.
People that live in the cities that are not homeless are also being exposed to the sanitation nightmare. Tourists and business travelers are also going into situations that they are not quit prepared for.
Here are some things you can do to protect yourself and your family if you live in an area where sanitation and living conditions are declining. I think that more people are going to find themselves in this situation before things start to improve. I just hope that the turning point is not a pandemic or a series of pandemics.
Actually it won’t.
For starters there are more people joining the ranks of the homeless every day. The economy is not that great and we have a nation that is highly addicted to pharmaceuticals and street drugs. We also have a system of support that distributes Narcan which can be used to counteract overdoses. This keeps people alive. There are plenty of people that have overdosed many times and been brought back from the brink of death.
The deeper issues that are causing this must be dealt with for there to be an end to the despair. Until we stop making addicts at an unprecedented rate, subsidizing bad behaviors, and encouraging people to come to areas that cannot support them, the conditions that lead to disease will continue.
In my area we have some excellent programs for those that are homeless but those programs can only support so many people and there are rules that must be followed. This has led to some coming to the area only to discover that they do not qualify for help because they are not a legal resident of the state of North Carolina. I am not talking about illegal immigrates either. I am talking about homeless people that are coming here from other states.
There are only so many resources in any city and when one gets the reputation of being the place to go for free stuff, resources get tight fast. Seattle is an example of this but residents of my small mountain county in North Carolina saw a significant homeless camp spring up when it was discovered that the help in our area was maxed out or they didn’t qualify due to residency or drug usage.
Doctor’s, nurses, EMTs, etc have a hard job and often suffer from
PTSD even if they are not entirely aware of it. I certainly would not
want to have to perform the daily tasks that they do to save lives on
a daily basis.
Some diseases that are popping up are so rare that they can take longer to diagnose and treat because the symptoms mimic those of other less serious conditions.
I hope that hospitals and emergency professionals are encouraged to brush up on the diagnosis and treatment of some of the diseases linked to poor hygiene and sanitation.
Has your area experienced any of the conditions discussed in
this article? Do you have any tips for surviving any of these
diseases? Do you have any solutions to add?
Please do not turn the comments section into a debate
between those that do not vaccinate and those that believe in
vaccinations. The issues we are facing in the cities are occurring
for many reasons, with sanitation and hygiene being the biggest
culprits.
Samantha Biggers can be reached at [email protected].com.
Updated Jul 5, 2019
Published Jun 10, 2019
Samantha Biggers can be reached at [email protected]
great information , thank you for your hard work !
Ron , in S.E. Texas
Very helpful info. Thanks!
Good stuff. Gonna print and keep that
typhus and typhoid are two different diseases, transmitted by different means and treated by different drugs. always double-check information you find in blogs and online articles, especially medical information.
the vaccines we have for any diseases are not 100% effective. they reduce the CHANCE of contracting the disease significantly, but not 100%. and they may become less effective over time. for example, if you were vaccinated for mumps/measles/small pox 30 years ago, it is not wise to crawl in bed with someone who has it now. you could have a titer drawn to see how much immunity you have left, or you could just be re-vaccinated (as it is cheaper), if your doc approves.
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Treating Medieval Diseases In Modern Times
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