Historic Epidemics: Malaria in the Vatican 1623

A short-lived illness that left 38 people dead in Italy in 1623 can hardly be called an epidemic of the likes of COVID19 or the Spanish Influenza. But historically speaking, a small event is often the spark that sets a fire. In this case, the minor outbreak led to a few Jesuit missionaries and the indigenous people of Peru saving millions of lives throughout the world from a pervasive and deadly disease.

We don’t hear much about it in United States, but malaria is–and has been throughout history–one of the leading causes of death throughout the world. In 2018, there were over 200 million cases of malaria diagnosed, and 405,000 people died from the disease–a huge percentage of them children.

And while there are currently several effective treatments for the disease, in poverty-stricken areas most people don’t get the treatment they need. Scientists have been–and still are–searching for an effective vaccine. (I won’t go into the effects of DDT in eradicating malaria, and plenty of other species.)

So how does this devastating illness relate to the Vatican in 1623?

Throughout Rome’s history, malaria has been a deadly killer. The name itself comes from the Italian mal’aria, meaning ‘bad air’. The Romans believed the disease came from the stench of the swamps and standing water around the city– and they weren’t far wrong. It was the mosquitos that came from the fetid that water carried the malaria parasite.

And so, on a wet August of 1623, a group of Cardinals met to choose a new pope after the death of Pope Gregory XV. Soon, the signs of malaria began to spread throughout the conclave — fever, chills, jaundice and body aches. Even the newly chosen Pope Urban VIII fell ill. All told, eight Cardinals and 30 other church officials died in the outbreak.

It was a small outbreak as epidemics go but an important one, and this is why: although Urban VIII survived the disease, word had already spread through the Catholic world that the Pope was in dire need.

When a young Jesuit missionary in Peru heard of the Pope’s distress, he was eager to share what he knew to be the miraculous remedy. He himself had been cured of malaria by the natives peoples of Peru with a tincture of the bark of the cinchona tree. As quick as could be done in those times, the bark was collected and began its long journey from Lima, to Spain, and on to Rome, where it was tested and hailed as a treatment and became known as “Jesuits’ Powder”.

We know it today as quinine.

Quinine was the only known treatment for malaria for the next three hundred years and saved countless millions of lives. Unfortunately, protestants in some countries like England believed that the treatment was part of a Jesuit plot to take over the country and wouldn’t use it. In an ironic twist of fate, Oliver Cromwell–the man who was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Irish Catholics–died of malaria, as he refused to use the “Jesuit’s powder”.

Of course, Catholics, Protestants and everybody else can thank the native peoples of Peru for their ancient remedy. Maybe we should be checking with indigenous peoples for a treatment for COVID19?

Read the other posts on Historic Epidemics:

Parrot Fancier’s Fever: Part 1 — how my daughter and her quail keeping led to learning of a 1930s epidemic

Parrot Fancier’s Fever: Part 2 — how a 1930s epidemic led to the creation of the National Institute of Health

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