Of the parasites, one stood out – the liver fluke.
That's because the location of the archeological site is situated in a dry area of the country. In fact, it's not too far away from China's Takla Makan Desert. The thing is, Chinese liver flukes are only native to wet marshy areas, so there's no way it could have been living in the area of the latrine. In fact, Mitchell says, it must first pass through a water snail and then a freshwater fish which much be eaten raw before infecting humans. Because no such animals exist near the latrine, the parasite must have been brought there by a traveler.
So just how far did that traveler bring his unfortunate cargo?
According to the researchers, based on current conditions, the only area it could have come from is about 1,500 km (923 mi) away. And today, the area where most of the infections are found is even farther, at 2,000 km (1,243 mi) away.
"When I first saw the Chinese liver fluke egg down the microscope I knew that we had made a momentous discovery," said Hui-Yuan Yeh, one of the study's authors. "Our study is the first to use archaeological evidence from a site on the Silk Road to demonstrate that travellers were taking infectious diseases with them over these huge distances."
While it's been previously suggested that major diseases like the bubonic plague, leprosy and anthrax spread along the Silk Road, the researchers say that there's never been hard-and-fast proof, because the organisms could have taken a different route between China and Europe.
"Our finding suggests that we now know for sure that the Silk Road was responsible for spreading infectious diseases in ancient times," says Mitchell. "This makes more likely previous proposals that bubonic plague, leprosy and anthrax could also have been spread along it." --
http://www.gizmag.com/Linkback:
https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=82532.0