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In the Middle Ages, devil-fearing Christians killed cats, which carried the unintended consequence of increasing the rat population and the spread of the Black Death
The Black Death, one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, spread across Europe between 1346 and The Black Death, one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, spread across Europe between 1346 and 1353. It is widely believed that the plague was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis.
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Actually,the fleas themselves killed the rats. Also,cats would not keep the rat population down because cats go after the easiest prey to kill..That's birds. The fleas would also have killed the cars.
Except it wasn't the fleas that caused the Black Death, it was what they carried. What's more, cats kill more rats than birds: 1, 2, 3. Sometime watch cats hunting things on the ground versus things that fly. The point the article makes about cats isn't that they are somehow immune to the Black Death, it's that superstition about them made the Black Death worse.