Medicine: Cholera

Natives of the northern mountains of India believe that cholera is a six-handed demon with no feet. Therefore it cannot leave its habitat in India's lowlands until some traveling hillsman comes along, upon whom it can lay its many clutches. Actually the cause of cholera is a microbe shaped like a comma, which enters the body only through the mouth, infests the digestive tract, irritates the bowels to such extent that they extract and eject quarts of fluid from the body. A victim of cholera may die—shriveled and cold from dehydration, uremia...

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