Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1049 Heaven-sent Land ([-])

At the end of September 1654, Ma Wanpeng arrived in Xinhua Harbor on his tuna fishing boat returning from Zanzibar Island.And from the moment he arrived at his official office, Pei Suoning, who had been in charge of the island's medical and health work, came to his door.

"Captain, there is very bad news." Pei Suoning, who was nearly forty years old, touched the top of his Mediterranean-style head and said with a frown: "Recently, diseases have begun to cover our heads, especially schistosomiasis and yellow fever. Fever, these two terrible diseases have caused a certain destructive effect in the whole city. This is really too bad. The Xinhua Health Center has admitted many patients with schistosomiasis. They have repeated abdominal distension and pain, but we can do nothing; There are also many yellow fever patients. To be honest, I don’t know when and where this disease came in. Maybe it was Ming immigrants, maybe Guarani people, maybe foreign businessmen, or those Damn it, oh, the origins of our people are too mixed, and viruses from all over the world are converging here, this is simply..."

Pei Suoning couldn't find the words to describe it for a while, and finally he could only complain: "No one can adapt to all the viruses all over the world, but we have too many viruses here, and everyone has to adapt to them. I Now I even have some doubts, maybe in a few decades or hundreds of years, maybe all the known diseases in the world will become the native diseases and custom diseases of our New China Island."

"What's the use of complaining so much, old Pei?" Ma Wanpeng sat behind his desk with a headache, then looked at Pei Suoning helplessly, and said, "At first there was a big outbreak of malaria and dysentery, and there was a period of cholera in the middle. It quickly faded away, and now it's schistosomiasis and yellow fever, which is really annoying. Is the tropics really that hard to conquer?"

In fact, to be honest, Ma Wanpeng has lived in Xinhua Island for many years, and he has heard about various tropical diseases. He knows that foreign colonists—especially colonists from high latitude regions—did death within the first few years of coming to the tropics. The rate is actually extremely high.There are many reasons. According to the theory of traditional Chinese medicine, the climate is unacceptable. According to the theory of later Western medicine, the flora in their bodies loses balance after they go to a strange place. —Whether it’s seen or not—when the body’s resistance has dropped to a terrible level, it’s impossible to recover without years of adaptation.But at this time, hearing that two infectious diseases broke out in relatively densely populated Xinhua County, how could Ma Wanpeng not be worried?

"Is anyone in Genoa suffering from these two types of diseases?" Ma Wanpeng suddenly thought of this question, so he asked immediately.

"No." Pei Suoning shook his head, and when Ma Wanpeng breathed a sigh of relief, he heard the fellow say, "But it's more terrifying than this. Some Genoese businessmen believe that the 'toxic environment' in Xinhua Port caused the The inhabitants fell sick and died in large numbers; of course some of them thought that the local hot and humid climate made people prone to heat and corruption, so many people would suffer from some diseases that they would never have in their lives in cold regions. I think …I think some of them are completely intimidated and will probably abandon their investment plan here because they will feel that it is too risky.”

"The outbreak of this epidemic is really not at the right time." Ma Wanpeng sighed, then leaned weakly on the chair, and said with some helplessness: "At first I wanted to fool some Italians into investing in this island, but now it seems The plan is going to go bankrupt—at least it will be greatly discounted compared to the advance plan—what a bad time. Forget it, let’s not talk about it! Well, the Italians don’t understand, but you should know the pathogenic mechanism and transmission route of schistosomiasis Bar?"

"Yes, sir, although we lack the necessary medical equipment to study such parasites, I am sure that the report sent by the local Ministry of Health is credible. Schistosomiasis is indeed a parasitic disease, not some poisonous air or It is caused by the environment, and we have a preliminary understanding of the transmission route, which brings convenience to the prevention and control." Pei Suoning said a little excitedly, "We have now instructed those who have to go into the water to take precautions and try to Avoid direct skin contact with infected water, patients who have already suffered from schistosomiasis are also isolated, and their excreta are also specially treated."

"Tell me about yellow fever." Ma Wanpeng nodded, approving Pei Suoning's prevention and treatment of schistosomiasis, and then changed the topic to another epidemic disease.

"This disease is more harmful than schistosomiasis, and it can also cause panic among residents." Pei Suoning said here that sweat dripped from his forehead, which was partly caused by heat and partly by tension. Listen to him continue: "We also communicated with the local Ministry of Health half a year ago. They thought it was a mosquito-borne disease, just like malaria. I agree, because I have seen a healthy person being killed. Mosquitoes that had bitten a sick person soon contracted yellow fever after a second bite, so we can now assert that yellow fever is also transmitted by mosquitoes."

"In a ghostly place like the tropics, how can people and animals not be bitten by mosquitoes?" Ma Wanpeng said anxiously. Even in places like his house and office where a lot of gauze curtains are installed, mosquitoes can still get through from time to time. Come in, not to mention ordinary people who need to go out to work during the day or even at night.It can be said that in Xinhua Island, if someone has not been bitten by mosquitoes all day, then this person must be very lucky, because the probability is close to zero.And in such an environment, even though people on the east coast do everything possible to prevent and control, there are still a large number of people suffering from various mosquito-borne diseases every month or even every day-malaria in the past, and yellow fever now sick.

"Sir, more than 200 people have been sick with yellow fever and malaria this month. Most of these people will eventually die." Pei Suoning said sadly, "New China is almost every day. A lot of people are dying, but there's nothing we can do about it, and cinchona has been introduced for so many years without success, and now there's a high incidence of yellow fever, which is really frustrating, really."

"We can only strengthen the prevention and control." After a long silence, Ma Wanpeng sighed softly, and said: "The swamps near the city continue to be drained, and the water in the small ponds used to provide water supply and beautify the city is also completely drained. In addition, it is necessary to reduce the still water bodies in the city as much as possible. In a word, it is to do everything possible to limit the number of mosquitoes. We may be able to bear malaria before, but now we have the same deadly yellow fever. I think We must take some action. Even if it will have a certain negative impact on our daily production and life, we can’t control that much now, after all, it’s better than losing our lives in a daze.”

Pei Suoning could only accept the words. After all, their current medical methods are actually very limited, and many diseases cannot be treated at all.Since the disease cannot be cured, it seems that prevention will rise to the first place.

After dismissing Pei Suoning, Ma Wanpeng thought twice and decided to meet the representatives of the Italian investment business group who had been in Xinhua Island for some time to see what they thought.

The Italians were living in one of the best state-run guest houses in Xinhua Port at this time. Unlike Ma Wanpeng’s imagination, these Italians were not frightened by the sudden epidemic in Xinhua Port. On the contrary, they still went out normally, When he came back to discuss behind closed doors, everything remained the same, which made Ma Wanpeng feel a little admiration for these people—the nerve toughness of these Italians is above the average level, and they are not for money or anything else Don't care about it?

In fact, this was Ma Wanpeng’s wrong thinking. In fact, in the old continent (including China) at this time, plague epidemics were commonplace, and it was also common for residents to die of a large number of diseases. People have long been used to it and even adapted to it.Therefore, although they were worried about the outbreak of an epidemic in Xinhua Port, they were not so afraid that they dared not go out. It was purely Ma Wanpeng's overthinking before.What's more, the Genoese are indeed very interested in Xinhua Island, a super large tropical island.

And since you are interested, then things are actually easy to talk about.In the next few days, Ma Wanpeng brought his secretary and entourages to discuss with the Italians in the guest house, to give answers to the Italians' questions or suggestions, and to promise various conditions or preferential measures.All in all, there is only one principle, and that is to do everything possible to attract Italian merchant groups, mainly Genoese, to invest in Xinhua Island—mainly sugar cane, tobacco, and pepper plantations. These three products are the most profitable in Europe.

In fact, Italian businessmen are quite pitiful, except that top companies such as St. George's Firm can have plantations of a certain scale in Peru and New Spain, and can also set up a business station in the port of Cadiz to resell special products from the New World. Other Italian businessmen have basically withdrawn from the Great Spanish market since the two countries became hostile in 1627—even if they did not withdraw voluntarily, their business has been deteriorating, and their market share has been continuously lost by Portuguese Jews, Dutch and a small number of Spanish. Businessmen embezzled, life is very difficult.Therefore, they now have a very strong urge to find new sources of goods-although the marketing network is slowly disintegrating, the backbone network still exists. As long as there are sufficient tropical commodities at this time, it is not impossible to restore these marketing networks possible things.

In this way, there is a solid foundation for cooperation between the people on the east coast and the Italians—in this matter, even the terrible tropical disease cannot make them give up completely.

(End of this chapter)