Welcome to my weekly newsletter, Age of Invention, on the causes of the British Industrial Revolution and the history of innovation. You can subscribe here: One of the most worrying diseases of the mid-eighteenth century was typhus. We now know that it is spread by lice or fleas, but at the time, like so many other diseases, it was thought to be caused by noxious air — “malaria”, for example, literally means “bad air”. This was not a silly theory. It was based on empirical observation, which perhaps explains why the belief in such noxious miasmas persisted for so long — well into the late nineteenth century, if not the early twentieth, before finally being ousted by germ theory. Our ancestors were not stupid, no matter how strange their beliefs might appear in hindsight. (Also take
The build up of CO2 creates problems for humans quicker than the depletion of O2 in a poorly ventilated space. I'm not sure if that explains the reduced mortality either, but CO2 poisoning makes you sluggish and eventually cause you to cease breathing (though initially it'll increase your breathing).
This effect is often seen when certain COPD patients are given pure oxygen in a medical setting, the poorly ventilated parts of their lungs are normally barely perfused (the body wants to send blood to functional parts) but when infused with oxygen it is tricked into perfusing them (ventilation-perfusion-mismatch) so CO2 builds up in the blood, when it's too high breathing ceases and the patient who initially responded well to oxygen suddenly crashes.
Intellectual article sir
The build up of CO2 creates problems for humans quicker than the depletion of O2 in a poorly ventilated space. I'm not sure if that explains the reduced mortality either, but CO2 poisoning makes you sluggish and eventually cause you to cease breathing (though initially it'll increase your breathing).
This effect is often seen when certain COPD patients are given pure oxygen in a medical setting, the poorly ventilated parts of their lungs are normally barely perfused (the body wants to send blood to functional parts) but when infused with oxygen it is tricked into perfusing them (ventilation-perfusion-mismatch) so CO2 builds up in the blood, when it's too high breathing ceases and the patient who initially responded well to oxygen suddenly crashes.