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“Sleeping sickness” … killed millions and turned others into human figures

Source: Arabic.Net – Taha Abdel Nasser Ramadan

With the end of the First World War, the world witnessed the emergence of a strange disease known as sleeping sickness, scientifically known as “developing encephalitis”, and causing suffering to millions around the world, especially with doctors’ inability to understand its nature and its ability to threaten human lives, as it caused sleep disease within a few years With the deaths of at least a million people and many suffering multiple disabilities, he made them unable to speak, crippling them and transforming them into human statues.

A picture of people with what is known as sleeping sicknessA picture of people with what is known as sleeping sickness

Despite the appearance of most cases of this disease after the end of the global conflict, many doctors believe the emergence of the first infected between 1915 and 1916, when a large number of soldiers showed symptoms of drowsiness, lethargy and delirium while they were in Paris Hospital.

First of all, the doctors thought it was related to the effect of the chemical weapon that the Germans used before they retracted these analyzes during the following years.

On the other hand, the same period witnessed the spread of the Spanish influenza pandemic that ravaged the world, claiming the lives of nearly 50 million people.

A picture of someone with sleeping sicknessA picture of someone with sleeping sickness

Because of this huge number of victims, most historians have focused on the Spanish flu pandemic and forgot about sleeping sickness.

Meanwhile, in 1917, the Austrian doctor specialized in neurology, Constantin von Economo, presented an accurate description of myelitis, which he linked with sleep and talked about his first symptoms, which ranged from malaise to headache before the patient experienced a state of drowsiness and delirium that sometimes led him Towards death.

Emoji pictureEmoji picture

A few years after what Von Economom published, sleep sickness transformed the lives of millions of families into hell, moving it from one house to another, threatening the lives of its inhabitants who were unable to stop it.

This disease mainly affected people between the ages of 15 and 35 years, and some of its symptoms were similar to flu symptoms, so the person rose fever, suffered from headaches, fatigue and a runny nose.

Photo of Doctor Constantine von EconomoPhoto of Doctor Constantine von Economo

According to an autopsy conducted by von Economo on one of the victims of this disease, the Austrian doctor observed a sharp swelling at the hypothalamus level, the hypothalamus, which controlled many functions of the human brain.

Among those infected with this disease, one third died, another third suffered permanent disabilities, while the rest managed to survive and were fully recovered.

Photo of Constantine von Economo's researchPhoto of Constantine von Economo’s research

After 10 years of analyzes by Constantine von Economou, sleep sickness, also known as encephalitis, gradually disappeared and remained absent for decades before some isolated cases appeared.

An MRI of a person with sleeping sicknessAn MRI of a person with sleeping sickness

Meanwhile, this disease remained a mystery that puzzled doctors and researchers despite the appearance of some suggestions that linked it with a rare type of streptococcus bacteria, and she spoke about the patient’s immune system attacking parts of the brain.

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