Rats have a bad reputation despite being adorable, intelligent, and proficient in the secret art of ninja. That might have something to do with the fact that rats and their fleas took the blame for the spread of the Black Plague in the 14th century, but new research may exhonorate them. Forensic scientists now say the plague was an airborne infection.
A team of archaeologists uncovered 25 human skeletons in London last year, and forensic scientists pulled samples of plague DNA preserved in the teeth of the remains. They compared that DNA to the strain of plague that killed 60 people in Madagascar recently, and found that they were almost identical.
Public Health England scientists say that for the infection to have spread so quickly in the 14th century, it had to have spread from human to human and infected the lungs. Further evidence of an airborne infection comes from a 1906 case in Suffolk. A family contracted the plague, and then spread it to their neighbor who came to help the family.
This isn’t the first time a theory has been presented to clear rats and fleas of their reputation as harbingers of the plague, but the evidence from these newly discovered bodies and the preserve plague DNA certainly make it one of the more compelling ones.
The theory is being presented in a documentary on Channel 4 titled Secret History: The Return of the Black Death.
(via The Guardian, image via **Two Pink Possums**)
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