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A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt

The current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has reminded us of past epidemics. Pharaonic Egypt has often been associated with epidemics and disasters through the 10 plagues in the Bible. The aim of this study was to examine which epidemics and serious diseases can be effectively proven...

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Autores principales: Habicht, Michael E., Eppenberger, Patrick E., Rühli, Frank
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of International Society for Infectious Diseases. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9186437/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33227516
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2020.11.160
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author Habicht, Michael E.
Eppenberger, Patrick E.
Rühli, Frank
author_facet Habicht, Michael E.
Eppenberger, Patrick E.
Rühli, Frank
author_sort Habicht, Michael E.
collection PubMed
description The current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has reminded us of past epidemics. Pharaonic Egypt has often been associated with epidemics and disasters through the 10 plagues in the Bible. The aim of this study was to examine which epidemics and serious diseases can be effectively proven for Ancient Egypt through mummies and historical source texts. The biblical plagues cannot be proven because there is no agreement on the dating of the Exodus, or the Exodus is a conglomeration of memories of different events. Other diseases such as malaria and schistosomiasis have been proven for Ancient Egypt, while polio and smallpox are still uncertain. There are indications of a bubonic disease from the time of the middle 18th Dynasty, but its exact nature cannot be determined from source texts or mummies, as they are too vague.
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spelling pubmed-91864372022-06-10 A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt Habicht, Michael E. Eppenberger, Patrick E. Rühli, Frank Int J Infect Dis Article The current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has reminded us of past epidemics. Pharaonic Egypt has often been associated with epidemics and disasters through the 10 plagues in the Bible. The aim of this study was to examine which epidemics and serious diseases can be effectively proven for Ancient Egypt through mummies and historical source texts. The biblical plagues cannot be proven because there is no agreement on the dating of the Exodus, or the Exodus is a conglomeration of memories of different events. Other diseases such as malaria and schistosomiasis have been proven for Ancient Egypt, while polio and smallpox are still uncertain. There are indications of a bubonic disease from the time of the middle 18th Dynasty, but its exact nature cannot be determined from source texts or mummies, as they are too vague. The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of International Society for Infectious Diseases. 2021-02 2020-11-20 /pmc/articles/PMC9186437/ /pubmed/33227516 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2020.11.160 Text en © 2020 The Author(s) Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active.
spellingShingle Article
Habicht, Michael E.
Eppenberger, Patrick E.
Rühli, Frank
A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt
title A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt
title_full A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt
title_fullStr A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt
title_full_unstemmed A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt
title_short A critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in Ancient Egypt
title_sort critical assessment of proposed outbreaks of plague and other epidemic diseases in ancient egypt
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9186437/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33227516
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2020.11.160
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