I have frequently heard about how smallpox devastated the new world’s indigenous populations during the beginning of colonization because they had no natural immunity. What I don’t understand is how did the reverse not happen. I naively assume indigenous diseases would impact Europeans and probably be brought back to Europe but I have never read of this happening.
In: Biology
So it’s a few things.
1) they absolutely did. Syphilis being a big one
2) relative densities. The European settlers were generally fewer in number in the “new world” creating less density of population to spread between. A lot of colonizers were *colonizers* they didn’t *go back*.
3) European society at the time was already more global than indigenous ones. The average European colonist had more exposure to different people, and thus different diseases, then the much more isolated native tribes, having had the opportunity to build a more robust immune system. They were more prepared to fight off foreign infections because they were more likely to have interacted with foreigners during their lives
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