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| Africa Subsaharan |
| Dances With Deaders Blamed For Madagascar Plague |
| 2017-10-27 |
| [NYPost] The deadly plague sweeping Madagascar may have a particularly gruesome cause — a local tradition of dancing with dead bodies. Health officials suspect it’s no coincidence that the outbreak — which has infected more than 1,100 people and killed 124 since August — coincides with the time of year when families customarily exhume the remains of dead relatives, wrap them in a sheet, and dance with them through the streets in a sacred ritual, AFP reports. “If a person dies of pneumonic plague and is then interred in a tomb that is subsequently opened for [the ritual], the bacteria can still be transmitted and contaminate whoever handles the body,” said Willy Randriamarotia, Madagascar’s health ministry chief of staff. |
| Posted by:Grunter |
| #6 Oh, take me back to Antananarivo Where Madagascans totentanz in vivo, And cringe when we so sensitively Tebow Above the skin and bones we give the heave-ho! Plague, shake a leg, etc. |
| Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 2017-10-27 23:55 |
| #5 Break Dancing? Le Danse Macabre? |
| Posted by: AlanC 2017-10-27 08:14 |
| #4 Waltz, Tango, Foxtrot. Or are they doing the Lindy |
| Posted by: Cheaderhead 2017-10-27 06:19 |
| #3 Think of it as evolution in action. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2017-10-27 03:03 |
| #2 Remind me never to visit Madagascar. |
| Posted by: gorb 2017-10-27 01:43 |
| #1 Wrap them in plastic first? You really ought to burn everything in contact with that body. |
| Posted by: newc 2017-10-27 01:41 |