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Text Chapter 624 The Year of Smallpox

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    At that time, Li Min had very few available manpower, so he moved a group of Hu people from the northern grasslands and organized the young and strong among them into an army, which became a sharp sword in his hand. Now this army is still active in various places.  , the status is only lower than the Han army, and higher than the status of the Sanhan, Japanese, Linyi and other armies.

    These migrating barbarians initially numbered only 170,000 people. However, after nearly ten years of fertility and multiplication, the total population of grassland people on Ezo Island has now reached 350,000. Among them are barbarians who later migrated there, and the largest number of others.  Especially after Li Min promoted Chinese culture among the Hu people, he strengthened the medical conditions on the island, which greatly increased the birth rate of the grassland people. Coupled with sufficient food, the population reached a peak growth area.  .

    The increase in population has also overwhelmed the land of Ezo Island, especially since some children have gradually grown up, but there is no more grassland for them to graze. This situation has attracted Li Min's attention, and even  He considered increasing the number of prairie troops to reduce the population pressure on Ezo Island.

    However, when Li Min arrived in Australia, he found that although Australia's agriculture was developing well, the animal husbandry was somewhat backward. This gave him an idea. If some of the grassland people from Ezo Island were moved here, not only could the island be eliminated,  It can overcome the pressure brought by the increase in population and also improve Australia's livestock industry to a higher level. It can be said that it kills two birds with one stone.

    Tang Yizhi and Li Ke also greatly appreciated Li Min's idea after hearing it. However, they were worried that if too many grassland people were moved, it would cause a large number of grassland people in Australia in the future, which would be detrimental to the Qi Palace.  's rule.

    Regarding this, Li Min doesn¡¯t think it¡¯s a big problem. Now those prairie people have been Chineseized, especially those young prairie people who have just grown up in the past ten years.  Their loyalty to themselves far exceeds their loyalty to the tribe. As long as these reliable people are moved over during migration, and then Australia's rule over them is strengthened, there will be no problems.

    After careful consideration, Tang Yoshi agreed with Li Min's view. So while he was preparing to recruit local natives, he was also preparing to accept grassland immigrants. He was very busy for a while.

    As for Li Min and Li Ke, they left South Australia three days later because the smallpox outbreak among the native tribes had become increasingly serious.  The death toll has skyrocketed.  Nan'ao City also responded immediately. The nearly 20,000 natives in the city were also urgently moved to an island outside the port and then underwent selection.  Start vaccination with cowpox in batches.

    In addition, through these native people, Tang Yoshi also released information to recruit the native people, and also announced the two major benefits of the native people's surrender. This made most of the native tribes very excited, especially those who were deeply affected by smallpox.  The tortured tribe.  Regardless of the dangers of smallpox, they sent people one after another to contact the Han people in order to get rid of the pain of the disease as soon as possible.

    However, not all natives will be recruited. In fact, Tang Yoshi does not intend to recruit too many natives. Firstly, he is wary of the local natives. Secondly, he does not have the power to control too many natives.  Many natives.  Therefore, in the first batch, he only recruited some tribes that were usually friendly to the Han people, and the number of them was also large.  There are only more than 50,000 people, which is enough for his needs at this stage.

    Nan'ao City was the last stop of Li Min's trip to Australia. They originally planned to stay in Nan'ao for a while, but unfortunately they had to leave early because of the sudden smallpox.  However, when passing by Rainbow Port, Li Min and the others stayed here for a while.  After all, this place is far away from the smallpox epidemic area, and Qinghe, Gao Yang and other girls also like the lobster and manatee here very much. They stay here just to eat enough before going back.

    However, in addition to tasting the delicious food, Li Min also visited Rainbow Port and took a boat out to visit the nearby Great Barrier Reef. He even found a shallow place to swim for a while.  It was so pleasant that they reluctantly left Rainbow Harbor until the end. At the same time, they felt a little regretful because due to time constraints, they could not see the colorful spectacle of the sea water outside Rainbow Harbor.

    Next, Li Min returned along the original route, and did not stop until Moli City. At this time, nearly two months had passed since they first arrived in Moli City. The steel plant was also under intense construction, so  Li Min stopped by the steel plant to check it out and express condolences to the workers who came with him.

    However, just when Li Min and the others were preparing to return, they received a piece of news. When Li Min saw the news, he sighed, thinking that the saying that misfortunes never come singly really makes sense.

    It turns out that just a few months ago, a smallpox epidemic also occurred in the Americas, and it was more serious than in Australia. The first area where smallpox appeared was the city of Mansa where Luwan and the others first arrived. There were thousands of people in the city.  People have the most contact with Han people. God knows which Han people have it.The smallpox virus suddenly broke out. Although the Han doctors in Luwan Port nearby tried their best to treat it, by the time the letter was sent, more than half of the Mayans in Mansa City had died of the disease.

    What¡¯s even more frightening is that smallpox began to spread to the surrounding areas with Mansa City as the center, and it spread extremely quickly. Half a month later, smallpox patients also appeared in Mayan cities hundreds of miles away from Mansa City.

    And the Mayans, like the Australian aborigines, apparently had no resistance to smallpox.  People who have just gotten sick will first have a high fever, then headache, sore throat and limb pain, and then they will start to have symptoms such as shaking, vomiting, diarrhea and so on. After two or three days, rashes will appear all over the body, and eventually complications such as sepsis will occur.  Symptoms, most people will die from the complications, and only a very small number of people with strong natural resistance may survive it. The symptoms will disappear after more than a month, but even if they recover, there will still be large and small marks on the patient's face.  Pockmarked, a few people will go blind because of it, which can be said to be very scary.

    The immune system of the Mayans has no memory of the smallpox virus at all, so their bodies are simply an undefended delicious meal for smallpox. As long as one person shows symptoms of smallpox, most of the people around him will also be infected.  Infection, and the Mayans had no experience with such large-scale plagues, and they did not know how to prevent the spread of smallpox, so this also led to the spread of smallpox throughout Central and South America in less than a month after it first appeared.  Come on.

    To make matters worse, the political and economic center of the Mayans, the Yucatan Peninsula, was also captured by the menacing smallpox. In such a relatively densely populated area, the spread of smallpox increased exponentially.  The disease was raging, and the number of deaths could no longer be counted. All the Han people in the Americas only knew that the Mayan civilization was disappearing rapidly. The earth was covered with the corpses of Mayans who died of illness, and one city after another became a deserted ghost town.  .

    Although Li Min, who received the news, did not see the tragic situation in America with his own eyes, he could imagine that, just like the smallpox virus brought by the Spanish when they invaded the Americas in later generations, the relatively fragile immune system of the American natives was fundamentally affected.  If you can't afford this test, it is reasonable for this situation to occur.

    Moreover, Li Min also knew that this smallpox epidemic was just the beginning. The Maya, located in Central America, connected the two major Americas, so the smallpox virus would definitely spread to North and South America with this as the center. This situation may continue for many years, and countless people  The number of Native Americans who would die as a result could be anywhere from millions to tens of millions.  Considering the mortality rate of smallpox, which is as high as one-third, I am afraid that the final death toll will definitely be much higher than the plague in Java.

    Speaking of which, this year is really strange. First, smallpox broke out in Australia, and then in the Americas. It can be said that this year can be called the "year of smallpox."

    And the smallpox outbreaks on these two continents are different from the plague in Java. The plague in Java was confined to an island. Although the mortality rate was higher than that of smallpox, it was not very harmful.  And to some extent, this plague is actually man-made.  In addition, there was a riot in Java first. If most of the natives could be wiped out by the plague, it would be beneficial to Li Min.

    However, smallpox in the Americas is completely uncontrollable, and can even be said to be a natural disaster. Moreover, the two continents are vast, and the local natives are also a resource that can be used by Li Min, especially now that he has a large Han population.  In the absence of sufficient resources, these natives became even more important. Unfortunately, the outbreaks of smallpox in these two places undoubtedly caused a great loss of this resource, and may even slow down Li Min's overseas development.

    In addition, the news of the outbreak of smallpox in the Americas also disrupted Li Ke's plan to personally inspect the three places. He originally planned to go to the Americas immediately after visiting Australia.  His trip to Australia was eventually interrupted by smallpox, but he barely got to know Australia. However, before leaving for America, he was interrupted by the outbreak of smallpox.  This made Li Ke very depressed, and he also wondered if he had a conflict with smallpox. Otherwise, why would he be involved in all this kind of thing?

    It is precisely because of this that Li Ke had to change his itinerary. After returning to Taiwan from Australia, he took a boat to Ceylon Island, and then went to visit his two brothers Li Zhen and Li Yun before finally taking a boat.  Head west to Africa and take a field trip to see what's going on there.  But this time he was the only one to go. Yang and his children were waiting for him in Taiwan. After all, Africa was not like Australia, and there were still certain risks involved in going there.

    However, Li Ke did not expect that his trip to Africa would not go according to the original plan at all. Instead, a small accident occurred midway, and it was this surprise that allowed Li Ke to achieve a journey of his own.  legend!
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