What we can learn from dealing with cholera, plague and smallpox

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Author Gutberlet: "Every epidemic has also brought good things"

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Agata Szymanska-Medina / DER SPIEGEL

Gutberlet, 53, works as a historian and author in Berlin.

He has written on medical-historical topics related to plague and polio and now, on the occasion of the corona pandemic, turned in particular to the epidemic history of Berlin and Prussia.

SPIEGEL:

Mr. Gutberlet, a representative survey by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation recently showed that almost a third of Germans believe in secret powers.

Didn't the enlightenment bring anything?

Gutberlet:

I'm afraid the propensity for conspiracy theories is a deeply human quality.

It has less to do with how enlightened a society is.

Even if facts are available, valid research results, you need the willingness and the necessary level of education to deal with them.

And in fact the latter seems to correlate clearly negatively with the willingness to believe in stories from dubious sources.

SPIEGEL:

According to the survey, one in 100 conspiracy theorists is certain that "Judaism" is one of those "secret powers" who strive for world domination - how much has changed since the Black Death was around in the Middle Ages?

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