Microbes maketh man, says J_J_Kennedy in “Pathogenesis”, a new book
were superior. As their populations boomed, genetic diversity increased and, since they lived in Africa, much closer to the equator than other humans,would have been exposed to a greater array of animals carrying a variety of microbes. Some of those microbes would have been pathogenic. moved across the world, they would have been protected against the diseases carried by the other humans they met.
Some of his most striking stories come from the Spanish conquest of the Americas. The prevailing story here is that the Europeans had better technology and weapons with which to subdue the less advanced societies in the Americas. That’s not entirely true, Mr Kennedy says. The introduction of infectious diseases from Europe, he writes, resulted in a 90% fall in the population in the Americas, from about 60.5m in 1500 to 6m a century later. If Europeans brought disease to those in the Americas, why didn’t American pathogens have a similar effect on the invaders? Many of the diseases Europeans had immunity to had originated in domesticated herd animals such as cows, pigs and sheep.
There is a hint of formula about this book: as soon as a new set of characters is introduced, you know infection looms. But that is a minor quibble in a compelling account of the role of bacteria and viruses in world history. Mr Kennedy marshals a dizzying range of material, from the transition from feudalism to capitalism in Europe to the rise of the slave trade to the defeat of the British army by American revolutionaries in Yorktown in 1781.
It helps that Mr Kennedy’s epidemiological writing is leavened with pop-culture references: “The Lord of the Rings”, “2001: A Space Odyssey” and Monty Python provide on-ramps for some of the complex tales Mr Kennedy tells. Despite the sweeping ideas, therefore, his book is an entertaining read. “Emphasising the role that infectious diseases play doesn’t exclude the possibility that humans can have an impact on the world,” he concludes.
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