Horny Brits Contract Syphilis Even During Pandemic

No one wants syphilis. Not personally—its symptoms include ulcers and insanity—and not nationally. The “French disease” as the English long called it, is an infamously “othered” illness. And the British are now suffering from an upsurge of syphilis, The Economist reported.

Photo Insert: A woman treating a sore on her lips

In 2014, academics in Bucharest traced its linguistic history and found that, even as the English used to call it the French disease, the French called it the Neapolitan one. The peoples of Central and South America consider the disease the worst export by the Old World to the New World.

The othering didn’t stop there. The Russians called it Polish, the Poles called it German, the Germans called it French and the Danish called it Spanish.

The Turks eschewed nationalism for sectarianism, calling it the “Christian disease”, while, as the researchers observed: “in Northern India, the Muslims blamed the Hindu for the outbreak of the affliction. However, the Hindu blamed the Muslims and in the end, everyone blamed the Europeans.” Not, perhaps, without cause.

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