Author:  Aiman Faruqi

On August 26, 1976, a 44-year-old man named Mabalo Lokela arrived at an outpatient clinic in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DCR) with a fever. Suspecting malaria, doctors prescribed chloroquine, a common antimalarial drug, and released him the same day. On September 5, Mabalo was admitted to Yambuku Mission Hospital in critical condition, with a severe fever and massive internal bleeding. Three days later, he was dead.

Author:  Emma Loewe

Black Death, the name given to a plague epidemic that eventually killed at least a third of London’s population, was most virulent between the years of 1348 and 1350. During this time, King Edward III ordered emergency burial facilities to be constructed outside city limits. A burial site for those killed during the Black Death was recently uncovered in Farringdon, a historic borough of London. Excavators came across the mass grave during a routine dig for Crossrail, a new urban railway system. The 25 uncovered bodies have provided scientists the opportunity to learn more about the disease that devastated fourteenth century Europe.