|
By BBC News Helen Briggs
 Signs
of malaria have been found in the skeleton of a child buried
in a Roman cemetery.
British
researchers say it is the earliest genetic evidence that
the disease plagued the classical civilisations of Rome
and Greece.
The
child was buried at a site north of Rome more than 1,500
years ago.
Analysis
of DNA extracted from the infant's bones reveals signs of
infection with the parasite that causes human malaria.
The
DNA evidence provides support for the theory that a lethal
outbreak of malaria in the fifth century AD contributed
to the downfall of the Roman Empire.
"We
can be fairly sure that the child died of malaria,"
said Dr Robert Sallares of the University of Manchester
Institute of Science and Technology (Umist), UK, who led
the research.
"Ancient
DNA research is a new way of investigating the history of
disease," he told BBC News Online.
"If
we can do the same sort of work on material from older sites,
we can determine when malaria entered Europe."
Argument
Terry
Brown, head of the department of Biomolecular Sciences,
where the study was carried out, said archaeological and
ancient historians have argued for some time about whether
malaria was a significant factor in the classical civilisations
of Rome and Greece.
"We
know that communities in Greece and Rome suddenly died out.
There's argument over whether some of these communities
were wiped out by malaria," he told BBC News Online.
 One
million children a year die from malaria
Genetic
analysis has documented cases of malaria in medieval times,
said Professor Brown. But the study, due to be published
in the journal Ancient Biomolecules, is believed to be the
first DNA evidence for malaria as far back in history as
late Roman times.
Roman
fever
The
name malaria is derived from the Italian, (mal-aria) or
"bad air". It was also known as Roman fever.
It is
a very old disease - indeed, prehistoric man is thought
to have suffered from malaria.
Each
year, 300-500 million people become ill with malaria and
several million die, mainly in Africa, India, South East
Asia and South America.
|
