Remember the Black Death? The disease that killed at least a third of Europe and set in motion the social and economic changes that eventually ended the Middle Ages?

Turns out it’s still around.

The Black Death hit Europe and other parts of the world every century or so after its first appearance; it even hit India in the early twentieth century. But it has gotten less and less virulent over the centuries. Maybe because it’s gotten weaker, maybe because it mutated, maybe because most people now have resistance to it. But this study shows strong evidence that the current bubonic plague is indeed the same one that devastated the medieval world.

That’s right – the Black Death is still out there.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 30th, 2011 at 3:04 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.