--- snitsnat <snitilicious at tampabay.rr.com> wrote:
> Did the area experience the Black Plague?
Encarta says "Plague was then spread west along trade routes. There were epidemics among the Tartars in southern Russia in 1346. Plague was passed from them to colonies of Italians living in towns along the Black Sea. Merchants probably carried the disease from there to Alexandria in Egypt in 1347; it then moved to Damascus and Libya in 1348, and Upper Egypt in 1349. Venetian and Genoese sailors are known to have brought the plague to Europe." http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761588279/Black_Death.html
I think the main factor is the incubation period. The USSR was a closed country until 1991, so they infection made in there later. (My Russian roommate had no idea what AIDS symptoms look like.)
(It's also possible that some people dying of AIDS-related diseases aren't being reported as such. Supposedly, and I don't know if I trust these figures, there are about 1 million HIV-positive people in Russia.)
Nu, zayats, pogodi!
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