May 22, 2020
Hello ,
The last week has been a tough one for me. More on that following my featured story. I want to start with good news concerning the AIDS/HIV epidemic.
In early March, when COVID19 had just bared its teeth in the U.S., a tiny glimmer of hope appeared in the search for a cure for AIDS/,HIV a virus that has claimed more than half a million Americans since 1981.
A year ago scientists announced a second person, identified only as "Patient London" was cured of HIV after receiving a bone-marrow transplant. Now that patient has gone public, announcing "I want to be an ambassador of hope."
We're all hoping for the best as restrictions loosen amidst the current pandemic. Can we be optimistic looking through the lens of history?
Pandemics that Changed the Course of History
Since the beginning of recorded time, plagues and epidemics have ravaged humanity and often plunged survivors into chaos, changing the course of history.
Unfortunately, AIDS continues to carry a stigma among some groups of Americans, but a diagnosis is no longer a death sentence and today the disease can be seen as a story of resistance and resilience. The AIDS epidemic roused courage within the LGBT community and its allies to organize in powerful ways that have changed America for the better.
Adam Castillejo decided to come out as the "London Patient" after remaining virus-free for one year and doctors could be more certain of his cure.
Castillejo received what he thought was his first death sentence when he was 23 and diagnosed HIV-positive in 2003. He did his best to stay healthy, but eight years later he suffered unexplained fevers and tests showed he had Stage 4 lymphoma.
“Once again my world changed forever,” he said. “Once again, another death sentence.”
The cancer turned out to be the cure, but only after a decade of punishing treatments and bouts of despair.
Seattle native Timothy Ray Brown became the first person in the world to be cured of HIV. He was identified as the “Berlin Patient” because that's is where he lived at the time he received a stem cell transplant for acute myeloid leukemia. The donor carried a gene mutation that doctors discovered carried an immunity to HIV.
The transplant cured Brown's cancer and his AIDS. That was 2007, and until recently, nobody knew whether his cure might be fluke.
Castillejo's medical treatment for lymphoma repeated the experiment. His bone marrow donor carried a similar immunity gene mutation, which essentially gave Castillejo a new immune system resistant to the virus.
This doesn't offer a widespread cure for HIV. It's highly risky, and only a last resort for the small percentage of HIV patients who would qualify. But this confirmation that AIDS can indeed be cured has invigorated researchers and provides hope for the future.
Now, about 64% of the estimated 40 million living with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) live in sub-Saharan Africa.medication developed in the 1990s now allows people with the disease to experience a normal life span with regular treatment.
The way that coronavirus has divided citizens is common to times of plague, though was much worse than today in the 1980s and 90s. Homophobia caused rampant fear and blame and allowed the government to neglect fair treatment for people with
HIV.
Resistance to quarantine appears to be another commonality during epidemics. Russians may not have created pithy posters during the the plague of 1770-1772, but in Moscow quarantined citizens rioted.
Violence erupted throughout the city, reaching a peak with the murder of Archbishop Ambrosius, who was urging crowds not to gather for worship.
Today, protests make great video, but America is not as divided as it appears in the news. A poll two weeks ago showed nearly two-thirds of Americans did not agree with opening up the country then because it would cause more deaths. Slightly more than one-third believed the country should reopen immediately.
A newer poll Wednesday by Quinnipiac University showed approval of the President's handling of the outbreak has dropped five percentage points since April.
However, the story of plagues, epidemics and pandemics throughout human history is clearly a cautionary tale.
Take the Plague of Athens: 430 B.C.
An epidemic spread through the city of Athens not long after the start of a war between Athens and Sparta, which became known as the Peloponnesian War. The sickness lasted for five years, killed possibly as many as 100,000 people, but worse yet, Athens never really recovered.
The war continued two-and-a-half decades after the disease swept through Athens, but historians say there is no doubt the plague changed the course of the war and the peace that followed.
Sparta's victory over the Athenians was the beginning of the end of the Greek democracy, altering the whole of Western History. Scientists cannot confirm the source of the plague, but have theorized it was possibly Ebola or typhoid fever.
Another plague, possibly smallpox, contributed to the fall of the Roman Empire.
The Antonine Plague: A.D. 165-180 vanquished the Roman army and killed over five million people across the Empire. By the time the sickness disappeared Rome began to tremble.
Seventy years later the Plague of Cyprian A.D. 250-271 struck, slaying 5,000 people a day in the city alone. No news on what caused it, but the plague was named after St. Cyprian, a bishop of Carthage who believed it was the end of the world.
Which it was for Rome.
A bubonic plague is blamed for the decline of the Byzantine Empire which stretched from the Middle East to Western Europe. The Justinian Plague A.D. 541- 542 was named the Byzantine Emperor Justinian. He recovered from the disease that wiped out an estimated ten percent of the world's population, and his empire.
Had enough? We have not even reached the sickness and disease brought to the Western Hemisphere by European explorers. A cluster including smallpox carried by the Spanish contributed to the collapse of the Inca and Aztec civilizations. Colonization of North America was aided by disease as well, including smallpox and alcoholism purposefully spread to indigenous people.
And I cannot end without mentioning The Black Death: 1346-1353, probably the most famous pandemic in history, and one of the few where something good came from it.
The Black Death likely spread from Asia to Europe by fleas on infected rodents,
destroyed over half of Europe's people and changed the course of history on the continent.
Losing that degree of the population allowed survivors to eat more meat and better bread. It made labor scarce, improving workers lives and leading to the end of the European feudal system. Some historians suggest the shortage of labor might also have contributed to innovation in farming, transportation and building.
And an army regiment marching down the streets of Seattle wearing masks here...In Gauze We Trust. On this last one you'll have to scroll down a bit.
Sources for the article above:
And neither did I forget the ten plagues of Egypt that freed the Israelites! This newsletter was getting long, so I decided just to include a link to an article about scientists' theories that explain those ancient plagues. Check that out here...
So here's what happened when I got down to work on my young adult novel after sending off my nonfiction manuscript about War Photographer Catherine Leroy. I realized the novel isn't working. There are many things I love about it, including a cowgirl rodeo champion, and I hope at some point I can rescue parts of the story to include in a later book.
This realization was hard to take. I had great faith in the story and believe it is some of my best writing. But publishing is a business, and I've become more savvy about what sells and what doesn't. I'm tempted to think it would have been much better for me to have figured this out before I spent two years working on the novel. But I refuse to think about that.
I spent a few days immobilized by disappointment and loss. At times my brain ran like a hamster on a wheel trying to come up with a new idea to replace the one I was letting go. At times I counted on my fingers how many years of writing life I might have left. For a few minutes, I wondered if I have been pursuing a goal that I will never reach. I wondered if I should find a different way to spend my time and energy, maybe retire. Those minutes passed quickly! 😉
I can't imagine doing anything other than writing, and I will not turn away from the challenge of publishing another novel. When the disappointment and loss lifted, I started to sketch out some ideas for a new story. Stay tuned! Stay safe.
Until next week...
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To find out more about my books, how I help students, teachers, librarians and writers visit my website at www.MaryCronkFarrell.com.
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