The plague doctor
Right now all of us Italians are experiencing firsthand what quarantine. is
We have been indoors for days, and we will have to do the same in the days to come, to win our war against Coronavirus.
We owe it to ourselves and to others.
Surely many of you will have wondered about what exactly the term "quarantine" means, why is it called that and what is the origin of both the name and the practice.
Here's everything you need to know.
Quarantine:what is it
Quarantine is a health strategy which consists of a forced isolation, which serves to stem the infection when there is the risk of an ' epidemic.
In practice, sick subjects isolate themselves from healthy ones, so that they cannot infect them.
Quarantine:origin of the term
The term means “40 days” , that is what, once, was considered the ideal duration of the separation between infected people and healthy population.
Today the quarantine does not have to be exactly 40 days, but simply indicates the practice itself (regardless of how many actual days it lasts).
A little history
Almost certainly the origins of the quarantine date back to the 1300s and, precisely, the dramatic period of the so-called black plague.
This expression indicates that epidemic plague than in the middle of the Middle Ages, from 1348 to 1359, it spread to Europe causing millions of deaths ( see also: https://www.pilloledistoria.it/3708/storia-moderna/peste-grandi-epidemie-storia).
It was then that the first quarantine in history took place.
In 1347, when a vessel from the East docked in the port of Ragusa (today Dubrovnik, Croatia), the authorities ordered its passengers not to get off before 30 days had elapsed, which then became 40.
This was to make sure that none of the foreigners were suffering from a disease that could then be passed on to citizenship.
The new method appealed to Europeans, who have been using it successfully ever since.
The lazarets
The hospital for plague patients in I promessi sposi
Who has read the Promessi Sposi by Alessandro Manzoni (I hope everyone!), he will surely remember the magnificent description of the lazaretto which welcomes the plague sufferers.
Well, the lazarets they were created with the precise purpose of acting as isolation centers for plague victims, who remained here in the hope of healing, but at a distance from the healthy population, who thus did not run or as far away as possible the risk of becoming infected.
The quarantine remains to this day the best defense weapon against contagious diseases.
In the past it was also used for leprosy and syphilis, recently for Ebola and now, unfortunately, for the Coronavirus.
So let's all stay at home and defend ourselves ( Photo from: ilpost.it and promessisposi.weebly.com).