Volyn fever

Volyn fever is an infectious disease that was common in Western Europe and Russia in the early 20th century. Symptoms of the illness included high fever, headache, body aches, fatigue and loss of appetite. The fever was caused by the bacteria Yersinia pestis, which is the causative agent of the plague. This disease was especially dangerous because of its ability to spread quickly and cause widespread loss of life.

The febrile disease was contracted in 1894 in Japan, and was first reported in Russia in 1913. It was given the name “Asian fever” (the official name is “Volshanskaya”, “Volyninskaya”, “grave”). This pathological process led to the fact that Russian cities (Zyryansky and Biransky regiments) turned into a battlefield among the inhabitants, where about 6 thousand people died in just a month. And a year later, in December 1994, in Uryupinsk, from the diagnoses found in doctors’ cards, one general diagnosis was compiled, terrifying both in the number of people who died from it and in the percentage of deaths as a percentage of the total number of patients. The diagnosis sounded like this: “Febrile illnesses during their severe course.” That is, the disease received official status only seven years after its epidemic.