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Dysentery

Diseases with the characteristic symptoms of dysen­tery existed in ancient times in China, Korea, and Japan. Dysentery-Iike diseases were given many de­scriptive names, such as red dysentery, bloody dysen­tery, red-white dysentery, thick-blood dysentery, and so forth.

The major symptoms common to the entire group were fever, stomachache, bloody excretions, spasms, and frequent diarrhea. Major epidemics are generally associated with true Shigella dysentery, but both bacillary and amebic dysentery were en­demic in Korea. Compared to other epidemic dis­eases, dysentery was not considered very grave, and therefore, it was often omitted from official chronolo­gies of epidemics.

The Hyangyak chipsong pang divided all diar­rheas into 23 different forms, including red dysen­tery. The text also describes various diarrheas that affect children and lists 10 different forms based on the symptoms that predominated under different conditions. Medical books written during the middle and late years of the Yi Dynasty also describe dysen­tery symptoms.

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Source: Kiple Kenneth F. (Editor). The Cambridge World History of Human Disease. Cambridge University Press,1993. — 1200 p.. 1993

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