Evolutionary, historical and political economic perspectives on health and disease

Food, Water, and Scarcity

“…Until such fundamental changes to the ecologies of poor nations, people in them would die of infectious diseases and "escape" the scourges of noninfectious ones. This model has, of course, been critiqued, largely on the basis of the now wellknown dual burden of infectious and noninfectious diseases that plague people in poor countries (Armelagos et al 2005;Barrett et al 1998). One of the important lessons that becomes clear in Wutich and Brewis's excellent paper is that poor or nonexistent water systems can be empirically connected not only to multiple infectious diseases, as is well known, but also to psychological stress, one particularly burdensome noninfectious global health problem.…”

Animal helminths in human archaeological remains: a review of zoonoses in the past

“…This may be McMICHAEL 80 argues that the historical transitions experienced by our prehistoric ancestors when they climbed down out of the trees onto the savannahs, incorporated meat into their diet, and more recently since the emergence of Homo sapiens, the development of agriculture, and the conquest of new territories and civilizations favored the emergence of (and exposure to) infectious agents of animal origin. ARMELAGOS et al 7 analyzed the epidemiological transitions experienced by humankind and concluded that we are undergoing a new transition, in which parasitic infections that were common 10,000 years ago, at the time of the first transition (with the development of techniques for cultivation of plants and domestication of animals), are now reemerging with the possibility of causing major economic impacts. The agricultural frontier's encroachment on natural areas and parasites' resistance to conventional treatments can explain this reemergence.…”

“…The increase in food production obtained through agriculture favored the agglomeration of individuals and consequently the occurrence of specific human parasites, transmitted by direct contact with environments and/or contaminated foods. In addition, the agricultural surplus was stored in deposits, increasing the potential risk of infection by contamination of the grain or other foodstuffs and by attracting animals like rodents 7,31,87 , the natural hosts of various zoonoses affecting humans 92 .…”

Demography and the extinction of European Neanderthals

“…As regards epidemics, it has been claimed that the low population density in the European Neanderthal society makes epidemic spread of diseases unlikely (Armelagos et al, 2003). However, the large mobility implied by migration and by huge hunting territories, as well as the need for members of each group (typically with about 10 adults) to visit other groups in an extended mating network (needed for reasons of countering fluctuations in availability of females and incidentally for reducing inbreeding problems) may weaken this argument.…”