Artículo de revista
Chagas' disease in pre‐Columbian South America
Fecha
1985Registro en:
American Journal of Physical Anthropology, Volumen 68, Issue 4, 2018, Pages 495-498
10968644
00029483
10.1002/ajpa.1330680405
Autor
Rothhammer Engel, Francisco
Allison, Marvin J.
Núñez, Lautaro
Standen, Vivien
Arriaza, Bernardo
Institución
Resumen
The quest for the origin and dispersion of Chagas' disease, the second most important vector‐borne disease in Latin America, has epidemiological, immunological, and genetical implications. Conjectures based on accounts of chroniclers, reviews of the archaeological literature and the present distribution of triatomine bugs, the vectors of the disease, held that the origin of the adaptation of Triatoma infestans (aspecies of the subfamily Triatominae) to human dwellings occurred in prehistoric times. The autopsy of 35 mummies exhumed in the Chilean desert, dated between 470 B.C. and 600 A.D., revealed the presence of clinical manifestations of Chagas' disease and put earlier speculations on a factual basis. Copyright © 1985 Wiley‐Liss, Inc., A Wiley Company