Talk:Disease in colonial America

page seems to ignore the plight of the red man. 90% perished — Preceding unsigned comment added by 32.178.116.11 (talk) 20:35, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

Needs textual editing and some clarification about the extent of communicable diseases. Very sketchy, deserves a lot of filling out, and the idea about expanding to call it "medicine in Colonial America" has greater merit to my mind. 198.176.188.201 (talk) 22:56, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Seems unnecessarily and inappropriately critical of the slave population (mostly Africans) for their role in spreading malaria and hookworm - perhaps because it relies on an old source for these sections. I don't believe that the slaves were any more likely to be reservoirs for the malaria parasite than any other infected person. Primitive housing and outdoor chores were common to whites as well so that mosquitoes had access to everyone. Also to state that the slaves were the ones "polluting the soil" and spreading hookworm ignores the general lack of understanding of the importance of sanitation and the casual emptying of chamber pots. Slaves may have been more at risk if they were more likely to be barefoot, but it seems really rude to speak of them "polluting the soil" as if they were the only ones. Eemstewart (talk) 04:23, 18 January 2017 (UTC)