Syphilis and Salvarsan.

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The progress of medical science is often written as if Western scientists brought effective cures into the modern world. The story of Salvarsan, the first modern scientific treatment for syphilis, shows a different story; one of exchange between Europe and Japan. Syphilis appeared as a new disease in Europe and Asia in the 15th century (Europe in 1495, in Japan in 1512). Over its first centuries syphilis changed from a very aggressive disease with a high early mortality to the more indolent disease we know today and which may have affected 10% of the population in England at the end of the 19th century.1 It was the AIDS epidemic of its day. The Swedish botanist Carl Thunberg (1743–1828) believed that he was the first person to supply a modern treatment for syphilis to the Japanese. He was a disciple of the botanist Carl Linnaeus and one of the very few …