#leprosy

[baudouinette]

Time Travel Issues: Curing Leprosy in the Middle Ages

I’m sorry I can’t be Claire from Outlander 😔

My first little comic lol (based on a meme but instead of leprosy it was about electricity) the idea was better in my head but I tried to depict it as best as I could

[formulas-fatal-to-your-mom]

[whiteskullofroses]

Baldwin IV of Jerusalem x physician!reader

(Before any of you get mad this is about Baldwin from Kingdom of Heaven not the actual historical figure.)

🩷Imagine Baldwin receiving the medication for leprosy along with a new physician who has to see his face for the first time and makes him feel comfortable about it🩷

"Y/N Y/L/N, is that who you must be?" Sibylla questioned. You had just been preparing to leave for the Palace, in which you'd be treating the King when she rode up to you with her horse. Her confidence amazed you, after all she was quite beautiful.

"Yes, my lady." Looking up at her with a bit of a struggle, since it was a hot summer day, the Sun was high up in the sky causing your eyes to burn when gazing up at her.

"Good. Follow me." She ordered and waited a short while for you to straddle your horse as well. You named your horse Sihara. You felt the need to do so as she was always with you on your travels. You were blessed with the privilege of having a loyal horse, tying her to a tree to avoid losing her was unnecessary. She simply never left you.

After you two left, there was another 15 minutes before you'd arrive to the Palace because the city was heavily crowded. Neither of you spoke much, from time to time Sibylla would as you questions regarding your medical career. It was reasonable of course. Her brothers life, whom she loved regardless his illness, was now at your hands.

This put a great amount of pressure on you. If anything went wrong, the people would kill you. She and her fellow men and women of power would hunt you down no matter for how long you'd hide.

But what could go wrong? All you had to do was apply cream on his open wounds for about 3 months until they'd heal and you'd go on with your life.

~.................~

"This way." Sibylla pointed to a long corridor with two guards standing at each side. There was another hallway on the right before you'd finally arrive to your patient.

The walk was filled with anxiety. You could feel your stomach twisting inside out with every step you took. You've saved many many lives and have helped many many people to gain back their health but this time it felt like it was your first time in the medical field. Like it was your first time keeping one on this Earth.

Maybe it was because this was your first time treating royalty?

But when you reached the doorway and saw the king sitting with his back to you, all worries went away. In a weird way, you could feel his calming and peaceful energy from afar, telling you 'everything will be alright.'

You weren't sure how to announce your presence in the room, but thankfully the King heard you walking and was about to make that clear.

"Come forward." His voice loud and clear. The way he carried himself, as though he wasn't sick fascinated you and had you admire him deeply.

He turned around on his chair to have a look at you, as you bowed.

"No do not kneel." Surprised, you got back up and straightened your back. "I'm glad to meet (your father's name)'s daughter. He was a great friend of my father's"

Baldwin got up from his chair and started walking closer to you. "The Saracens say that this disease is God's vengeance against the vanity of our kingdom." He chuckled and added: "My guesses are you are to remedy this so-called curse casted upon me."

"Certainly, my lord." You gave an innocent half smile and nodded.

The king turned his head towards a table: "Come, sit."

As you walked closer you noticed there was displayed the popular game amongst men of power all over the world. Chess.

The two of you sat down, a servant served you wine and than the serious conversation began: "Y/N, I must ask this. How is the healing process going to affect my duties?"

"Not at all." You answered with much confidence. "All I have to do is apply the medicine on your wounds and areas that have in general been infected the most." Explaining to him as Baldwin leaned forward, signaling for you to go on: "This should last approximately 2 to 3 months."

You could sence that he was nervous. After all he was still so young and probably still insecure about his features, as much as someone with a disease that disfigures you can be.

"My lord, you can trust me. Worrying is out of the question here, after all I've been in the medical field all my life. I promise to you I won't let you down." Your words were full of pure determination to save him, they cut so deep into his heart in the best way possible he could just tear up.

~.................~

As you were mixing up the cream that was soon ready to be applied, the tension in the room was indescribable. Baldwin layed on the bed almost unmoving.

His upper body and legs were exposed. What you could see from the start was that his left arm was most infected, than any other body part.

Besides that he still had his mask on, which he would have to remove at some point to get the full healing process done.

The medicine was prepared. You put on your gloves and went to work.

"My lord, if you feel any discomfort during this, please warn me immediately." You stated.

He nodded and even though you couldn't see it because of the mask, the young man was blushing. So far all his personal physicians were males, and since he was sick he was never really touched by a woman in the slightest, besides his mother when he was younger, so of course he was flustered.

You applied the cream firstly on his left arm, being extra careful and waiting for any signs of nausea from the king. Sometimes treating people who have been infected with leprosy can be quite a pain since vomiting and dizziness are common side effects. Luckily the king was doing just fine and in silence you slowly applied the cream all over him. Except his face.

"My lord, may you now remove your mask please?" You smiled softly at him, really trying to get the young king to get comfortable around you since you'd be doing this for 3 months together.

"Is it necessary?" He hesitated. Feelings of shame and insecurity flooded his mind. He never let anyone see his full face, especially not a young woman whom he learned love to gossip around since his sister and her friends used to do it for as long back as he can remember. But this time it was different, and you wanted him to understand so badly: "I understand you may not feel comfortable doing so, but trust me I wish the best for you. To have this treatment the most affective it can be, I'll need to apply it on your face too." You explained as gently as you could.

After a moment, he did it. And he looked beautiful. His face was decorated with a pair of blue eyes and soft locks of golden hair. His face was of course infected, he didn't have a nose and there appeared to be a quite litteral hole in his right cheek but you didn't care. He was handsome no one could deny that.

So you smiled and commented: "My lord, I really can't comprehend why you were so afraid."

He looked up at you, who was now slowly smearing the medicine on his face.

"Is it really that hard to understand?" He sighed.

"My lord, you look just as handsome as any. Infected or not. You are someone young men should look up to. A true God's warrior."

He took a deep breath in, smelling the healing herbs on him.

When you turned around, he shed a tear.

THE END.

[somethingstrangeishere]

TW: leprosy

Baldwin IV with his mommy 🥺

She tries to cheer up her precious boy by doing something sweet for him.

"No, my dear, those bandages don't make you any worse! Please stop putting yourself down for how you look...Look, I made a bow for you! You're cute. I love you, Baldwin."

***

I don't know if you've ever had similar thoughts...I just felt like speaking up. Honestly, it's very hard to put my thoughts and convey what I'm feeling (I'm not a writer and also not a native English speaker), and to be completely honest, as I think about it, my heart hurts and my eyes water. So if you read this - thank you, and sorry for taking up your time. If not - well, I've eased my soul one way or another by speaking out.

***

My heart melts at the thought of a warm, understanding and trusting relationship between parents and children, and I also love the dynamics of family relationships. In this context, mother/son. I don't know, and no one knows anymore, about the relationship Baldwin had with his mother, whether they were close, but I'm not relying on historical reference, but on my interpretation and feelings.

For a good loving mother, her child is the best, the most precious, the most loved and desired. But life does not always turn to you and your child in a good way. Some people are unlucky - whether you are a king or a peasant, a sinner or a saint - fate does not care.

How does a mother feel when her son is mortally ill? Put yourself in her shoes. Just try it.

***

You hold your newborn baby in your arms. Here it is, your little bundle of joy, so tiny, so adorable... You want to give him all the best, now your whole world is him, your little angel!

Your son is growing up, taking his first steps, saying his first words. You dream about his future, you love him so much...

Time passes, you live in love and care for him. And you hope that it will always be like this - or as long as possible...

...Now forget about it.

Suddenly you are hit with devastating news - your son has leprosy. It knocks you off your feet, it chokes you, it tramples you into the ground, tears your heart to pieces. At that moment, as soon as you find out, you see nothing in front of you and hear nothing. Your mind is empty, and there is only one thought of your son, your treasure. Doomed, cursed. If there really is a God, why did he let this happen? Why your child? They say leprosy is a curse from God. Why curse an innocent child?!

Pain, despair, anguish. You want to weep, You want to grab your son, hold him close and never let go. You realise he's doomed. But he doesn't realise it yet.

As time goes on, his health gets worse. Your baby does not understand what is happening to him - he is scared, he is confused, he is waiting for your support and comfort. You smile at him, you give him everything you can - but inside your heart is pounding and tearing as if it were breaking your ribs. Every night you're choked with tears. Your son is your flesh and blood, you gave him life, you brought him into this world, you condemned him to this existence...

Time passes, you do your best, but it seems as if God himself has turned away from you. You pray to all the saints, you beg the Virgin Mary - she is a mother too, she must hear, she cannot fail to understand! But nothing changes.

Your son is growing up, and every year his condition gets worse. His skin is covered with leprosy spots. His eyesight is getting worse. He's always tired, he can't live without the help of doctors and medicines. He's rotting alive. People look askance. People judge. People see a monster. All you see is your angel. Every day you swear to love and care for him, swear you won't leave him...

***

A young 16 years old boy wins a battle. How proud you are of him! How weak his body is, but how strong his spirit. But he too has his moments of vulnerability...

...Especially when he fully realises he doesn't have long to live. He seems to accept it - or pretend to accept it...

How do you feel?

How a mother might feel when she realises that she may see her son die? Bury the one she brought into this world. To live to see that moment is something she doesn't want to do.

Thank you if you read to the end! I'm crying right now😭

[one-time-i-dreamt]

There was a type of leprosy which instead of making your nose fall off, just moved it really far to the right.

[ollyvoile]

Add your reasons, if you like!

Other people have added these:

• Yellow fever @notoverjoyed

• Scurvy @monitorchakas

• Lymph disease @wyrmalien

• Diphtheria ( I couldn’t fit this one)

• Malaria “ye olde marsh fever” @bombadilbaddie

• Scrofula “The King’s Evil” @hasturswig

Edit for all the people telling me “uhhh tuberculosis still exists”: I know! :) In fact, all of these sicknesses still exist. In the modern world we live in, however, most of these are only prevalent in developing countries, and certainly not to the extent they once were.

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

[madbedlam]

++

my guilty ship~

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[mindblowingscience]

A 54-year-old Florida man diagnosed with leprosy in a case report published this year added to a growing number of cases detected in the south-eastern United States in recent times, which appears to be a new hotspot for the disease. It follows recent alerts from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of the first cases of locally-acquired malaria in the US in two decades; four of which were in Florida.

Continue Reading.

[centers-for-disease-control]

Alright, due to popular request, I bring you the break down of the Taiwan Disease Personifications. Also, just so y’all know, the official explanations for the designs are not easy to find, so a lot of this is just from what I notice and what I know about the diseases

To start off, we have everyone’s favorite disease: COVID-19

So, this is one of the designs where I could actually find the artist explanation, so I will be including that information plus a couple things I noticed and how I think it fits the disease. So let’s start with to crown. The reason for the inclusion of the crown is the reflect the name coronavirus, corona being the Latin word for crown. The face is partially obscured because of COVID’s tendency to hide itself. The bean bag chair that they are sitting on has many protrusions signifying the spike proteins. The different digital devices represent how the world went virtual during the pandemic and the news channels behind them represent the media’s freak out when COVID was at its height. The floor has an outline of the world because everywhere was affected by the pandemic. Also, if you look closely, they are wearing little Covid earrings.

Next up, we got Zika:

I could not find an official artist statement for this design, so take my explanation with a grain of salt. So first off the red waist band reminds me of the red stripe that goes down the abdomen of the mosquito species that spreads Zika after it has fed. Also, the white markings on the black are also a characteristic of this species of mosquito. In fact, the design is the stripes on the chest look like the markings these mosquitoes have on their back. She presents female because it’s the female mosquitoes that bite and spread diseases. Her sleeves look like mosquito wings once again a reference to mosquitoes being the primary vectors of Zika. The area behind her has palm fronds to represent that Zika is a disease typically found in tropical climates.

Next up we have: Hansen’s Disease (aka Leprosy)

This is one where I could find the artist statement due to it being a pretty recent one, however, I will say that at least the translation was a bit lacking in describing the reasoning of every detail. She is a mask maker because leprosy changes how people perceive those who are infected but it is something that can easily be removed with modern antibiotics. She has different accessories like the lion and crocodile headpiece that implicate the divine involvement because leprosy has been historically thought to be a punishment of the gods. The scales on her arm look like an allusion to the scaling pattern scars that those with leprosy would develop.

Next up: Rubella

After a lot of digging I found the official profile for this design but it didn’t really explain the design choices so we are going to do more analysis on my end. So the pomegranate and the red dots represent the red rashes that come with rubella infections. The glasses I assume are to show how Rubella can lead to Congenital Rubella Syndrome (CRS) which can occur in children if their mother had rubella while pregnant. One of the symptoms that comes with CRS is cataracts.

Next up: the plague

I found the explanation on this and it just confirmed my own suspicions for certain design choices. So her design is very focused on death and mysticism because of how the Black Plague led to a lot of cultural focus on these two ideas. Behind her are old coins because of the economic impact the plague had on the civilizations of its time. The references to death are the skeletal pattern on her dress, and the scythe behind her and on her belt. The references to mysticism include the tarot cards she is holding and the crosses on her hat. On the tarot cards are designs referencing the three different forms the plague takes (bubonic, septicemic, and pneumonic) as well as a posey which was used to try to ward of the plague in old times. On her hat is also a collection of plague doctor masks which is pretty self explanatory as to how that connects.

Next up: Ebola

I couldn’t find the official explanation for this disease, so this is mostly speculation based on my analysis. Her outfit is red because of the hemorrhaging that comes with the disease. Specifically he lips are red because one of the more unique characteristics of Ebola is hiccuping up blood. The accessories seem to be inspired by central and western african traditional jewelry. There appear to be tribal masks on the necklace, I am not well versed in African art unfortunately, so any deeper meaning of these accessories are unfortunately lost on me. There are bats on the headdress because of bats being the natural host of Ebola. Her design is rather demonic because Ebola was so terrible for the areas affected, that people thought it could be caused be some great evil. The skulls are because of the extremely high death rate that comes with ebola. The leaves and fruits shown come from the African jungles which is typically where Ebola outbreaks start.

Next up: Novel Influenza A Virus Infections

I actually found the artist explanation for this design! As a disease closely associated with birds, there are many elements linked to birds. There are many bird shadows, the hair that looks like feathers, and the beak shaped mask, feathers on his tie and a feather tattoo on right arm, and the “H-N” pin (H and N proteins of the influenza virus).

Next up: Dengue Fever

Another one with an artist statement! Since only female mosquitoes bite, the character is set as a female. Her dark red lips represent mosquito’s instinct to bite, and she is holding a poisonous thornapple flower. She has mosquito wings tattooed on her back and thornapple flower tattooed on her arm. I have spent a long time looking into how the thornapple flower relates to dengue, but I haven’t had a lot of luck. From what I have seen is that the roots, seeds, and leaves are used in some traditional medicines, including treatments for malaria, but I have not had luck finding how it is connected to Dengue specifically.

Next up: Japanese Encephalitis

I found the artist statement for this disease as well. The disease is visualized into three characters that form a pop group, with their names reflecting the 3 main Culex mosquito species that spread Japanese encephalitis in Taiwan, which are Culex tritaeniorhynchus (Three), Culex annulus (Ring), and Culex fuscocephala (Shiro). They wear black and white, like the colors of the Culex mosquitoes. Red accessories represent their love for blood. I don’t have much to add outside of the artist explanation.

Last one for now is: Rabies

I found the explanation for this one, but it is not descriptive at all, so I am going to be going into every detail because this is Rabies. The spikes on the jacket and pant legs represent the protein spikes rabies uses to infect nerves. The blue jacket and gloves are representing water as one of the unique characteristics of rabies is hydrophobia (physical repulsion to water). The claw marks on the shirt show the animalistic tendencies the virus brings out. The violin players in the animal mask show how the virus can hide in these animals. The personification of rabies is holding a conductor’s wand showing how rabies controls those who are infected. The teeth necklace shows how it spreads through bites and they are standing on the brain because that is what rabies infects. He has a chain with mammal skulls once again tying back to rabies being a fatal mammalian disease. The belt buckle has a bone on it as bone are associated with bones and rabies is associated with dogs.

[mar-tacuba]

Oaktown OC: Leprosy. Royal guard of Kuun Kingdom.

☆More stuff below

Casual outfit

[baudouinette]

Leper King 💅🏻✨⚜️🎀

[stubberudsgirl]

are you fucking kidding me right now. oh my goodness gracious holy fuck.

[somethingstrangeishere]

Trigger warning! Leprosy, facial deformation, scars.

***

[ringio]

The Leper King

Dialogue from Chapter 2

Right now, I am not able to concentrate and make a quality translation of my fanfic. However, I have animated a small dialogue from it (please watch with sound).

Thanks to @madeleinerosexxx, who drew our attention to such a wonderful image of Baldwin IV in a hood. It inspired me to create this video. Hopefully, you don't mind that I used it.

Special thanks to the developer of the chat animation app, without which this dialogue would have been technically much more difficult to visualize: https://chat-animator.net/

At the moment, only the 3rd chapter has been translated into English: https://www.tumblr.com/ringio/755461785077891072/the-leper-king

The full story in Russian is available here: https://www.wattpad.com/story/325848978 (age limit 18+)

Music and sound effects: pixabay.com

Images: unsplash.com, the film "Kingdom of Heaven"