Climate Change Thread

[Pannonian]

I was commenting more on the location than the time period: a usually livestock derived virus ending up in the remote areas of the arctic that didnt thaw before modern times? Anyone know how often eskimos encountered these diseases?

In comparison a human from a agricultural society tooling about a glacier and falling in while infected is a lot more likely.

Didn't the Black Death originate in the steppes of Mongolia, where there are still occasional cases of bubonic plague?

You are presuming that the recorded medieval outbreaks of these diseases were their inception points. Viruses, in particular, are known to be able to survive inordinate periods of time. Who is to say that the medieval instances of these disease were their first time winging about the world?

There's at least one case of bacteria surviving the vacuum of space.