ironic how the semester i took an epidemics
class, we ended up having a pandemic. anyways, i took the final for my plagues
class today. it was pretty difficult, but as i was looking through the notes
beforehand, i came across kuru and forgot how crazy it is. kuru is a disease
you can get by eating human brain with infected prions. it’s fatal and it was
popularly studied in a tribe of new guinea where cannabalism was standard.
there is no cure to this day. once you get infected, you begin trembling or
laughing uncontrollably before you pass away. it’s a very tragic disease, but
one that is the most interesting i have come across throughout my years at
university. crazy thing is that one of the scientists who studied and provided
informative insight to kuru, later became a convicted child molester. shit
caught me off guard when i was doing research, but regardless, look it up if
you have some time to kill.
-ratha, 12:48pm, 5.6.20