Suette

The Suette is a epidemic Infectious illness characterized by a important Fièvre, a Transpiration profuse and a high mortality. One distinguishes two varieties from them:

the English suette (in Latin: sudor anglicus ) which prevailed on an epidemic mode with five recoveries with the XVe and XVIe century S in England.
the milliary suette , thus named because it is accompanied by a cutaneous eruption in the shape of grains of Mil.

The English suette

It is about a mysterious and highly virulent disease which struck the England then the Europe in the form of recurring epidemic S. The first epidemic took place in 1485 and the last in 1551 after which the disease completely seems to have disappeared. The epidemics took place especially during the summer and at the beginning of the autumn and concerned a population of male adult subjects. The beginning of the symptoms was sudden and spectacular and death occurred in a few hours. The etiology in remainder unknown factor.

The Hyperhidrose is a symptom sometimes improperly called “suette” ( sweating disease ) by the Anglo-Saxon

History

The epidemic of 1485

The suette drew the attention of the doctors to the whole beginning of the reign of Henri VII of England. She was known, indeed, a few days after the unloading of Henri with Milford Haven the August 7th 1485, because formal evidences are had that one spoke about it before the battle about Bosworth Field the August 22nd. The epidemic burst on London shortly after the entry of Henri VII in the capital the August 28th, and made a few thousands of deaths there, until its extinction towards the end of October of the same year. Among the victims, two mayors of London, six aldermen and three sheriffs appeared. This worrying disease was soon known under the name of suette. It was well identified like distinct from the Peste, the pestilential fever or other already known epidemic diseases, not only by its characteristic symptom, the hypersudation, but also by its progression striking down towards the fatal outcome.

The suette probably reached the Ireland in 1492 date on which annals of Ulster record the death of James Fleming, baron de Slane, from the pláigh went “recently come to Ireland”. Annals of Connacht also recorded this death, and Annals of the Four Masters announce “an unusual plague” to Meath, “one 24 hours duration”; and that whoever survived it beyond this time cured. It did not attack the infants nor the young children. It should be noted however that Freeman in an annotation of bottom of page of Annals of Connacht challenges the possibility that this plague was the suette, in spite of the resemblance of the names, but rather evokes a “fever of the hunger with relapses”, perhaps the Typhus.

Epidemics of 1507 and 1517

The suette did not make any more speak about it of 1492 with 1507, year during which one second epidemic occurred, of quite less revolved than the first. Ten years later, in 1517, burst the third epidemic which was much more severe. It had a important Death rate with Oxford, Cambridge and in other cities going until decimating half of the population of some of them. The disease did not extend elsewhere than in England, except for the towns of Calais and Antwerp where some cases were observed.

The epidemic of 1528

This year, the disease remade its appearance for the fourth time and struck with a great severity. It appeared initially in London at the end of May and extended quickly on all England, by saving the extreme north of the country, the shells and the Ireland. In London, mortality was very high; the court was decimated and Henri VIII was seen constrained to flee the city and to often change residence. It is thought that Anne Boleyn could have contracted the disease and to have survived there. The most remarkable fact concerning this epidemic is that it was spread on Europe, having made suddenly its appearance with Hamburg and being propagated so quickly that it killed a thousand of people in the space of a few weeks. Terrible the suette thus continued its destroying walk towards the east of Europe being spread with the manner of the Choléra with an appalling mortality. It reached the Suisse in December, then more in north the Denmark, the Sweden and the Norway, and in the east the Lithuania, the Poland and the Russia. It also emerged in the regions belonging today to the Belgium and with the Netherlands, probably coming straight from England because it appeared simultaneously in the wearing of Antwerp and Amsterdam in the morning of the September 27th. It never appeared on the other hand in France or Italy.

In all the places which it infected, the disease had only one very short duration, generally not more than two days. With the end of the year the suette had entirely disappeared except in Eastern Switzerland where it lasted until the following year. After which it did not reappear any more on the continent of Europe.

The last epidemic of 1551

The vague large last of the disease occurred in England in 1551. An eminent doctor, John Caius, was at the time a direct witness and wrote a report entitled: has Boke gold Counseill Against the Disease Commonly Called the Sweate, gold Sweatyng Sicknesse .

The disease was never again observed in England after the year 1578.

Symptoms

The symptoms described by Caius and other doctors are the following. The disease started very suddenly with a feeling of apprehension, followed by shivers (sometimes very violent one), giddinesses, headaches and strong pains of the nape of the neck of the shoulders and members accompanied by a great tiredness. After this cold phase, which could last half an hour at three hours, occurred the hot phase with sweats. Characteristic perspiration started abruptly without apparent cause. At the same time as this one, or after it had abundantly run, there was a feeling of heat, headaches, one is delirious, an acceleration of the pulse and an intense thirst. The Palpitation S and the pain in the area of the heart were frequent. No cutaneous eruption was never noted by the observers including by Caius. At the final stages, one could note a general exhaustion with Collapsus, where an irresistible tendency to Sommeil, that one thought fatal if one allowed the patients to yield to it. A first access did not guarantee the immunity and some suffered from several attacks before succumbing.

The milliary suette

Also known under the name of “suette of Picardy” ( Picardy sweat ), it occurred in France between 1718 and 1906. This variety was less often fatal than the English suette and was accompanied by an cutaneous eruption, absent in the epidemics of suette observed hitherto.

The few epidemics observed locally were the following ones:

in 1821 in Seine-et-Oise. This epidemic is described with meticulousness by Pierre Rayer in a monograph published in 1822
in 1841 in the Dordogne
in 1845 in the Vienna,
in 1906 in Charente, the latter having been the subject of a thesis in 1907

Causes

It is about the most mysterious aspect of the disease. Old and modern commentators accused the conditions of dirtiness which prevailed at the time and the waste water could have sheltered the source of the infection. The fact that the first wave of suette emerges at the end of the Guerre of the Two-Pinks indicates that it could be transported of France by the French mercenaries that Henri VII employed to conquer the throne of England, because they appeared immunized. The disease seems to have been more virulent in the rich person than at the poor and this can explain why it drew more the attention than other diseases of the same time.

The recurring fever was proposed like possible cause. This disease transmitted by the Tick S and the Lice, more frequently occurs during the summer months, as in the beginning the suette did it. However, the recurring fever is characterized by a black crust with the site of the bite of the tick, followed by an cutaneous eruption, a relatively obvious sign that the observers never raised, which returns the identification of the doubtful disease.

More recently, of the viruses of the group of the Hantavirus seemed serious candidates with the role of possible agents of the disease.

However, certain clinical characters of the epidemics with hantavirus do not seem to tally with the progression of the suette; more specifically one observed only seldom a transmission interhumaine of the hantavirus, whereas it is thought that it is this mode of transmission which prevails in the suette. Although the epidemics of pulmonary syndrome in Hantavirus have a clinical picture very similar to that described in the suette, many unsolved questions still leave the open door to other theories concerning the etiology.

Source

External bonds

Ask Yahoo -- What exactly was the sweating sickness?
E. Bridson - " The English “sweate” (Sudor Anglicus) and Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome" in '' Br J Biomed Sci. '' 2001; 58 (1): 1-6.
'' Sweating Fever '' Dr. Jim Leavesley commemorates the 500th anniversary off the first outbreak - transcript off talk one Ockham' S Razor ABC Radio operator National

References

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