Cholera: More Complicated Than You Think?

Photo: Otis Historical Archives National Museum of Health and Medicine

Cholera, long considered “a disease of filth carried in sewage,” is a little more complicated than that, writes the science journalist Sonia Shah. “[R]esearch on cholera’s natural habitat and links to the climate have revealed a revolutionary new understanding of the disease as one shaped just as much by environment, hydrology, and weather patterns as by poor sanitation,” writes Shah. “And as temperatures continue to rise this century, cholera outbreaks may become increasingly common, with the bacteria growing more rapidly in warmer waters.” In fact, some scientists believe they’ve already found evidence of climate change’s effect on cholera: “Over the past 30 years, El Nino events in the Bay of Bengal – characterized, in part, by warmer sea surface temperatures – have increased, paralleling a rise in cholera cases in Bangladesh. The World Health Organization calls it ‘one of the first pieces of evidence that warming trends are affecting human infectious diseases.'”