700-year-old Bolivian mummy tooth reveals scarlet fever bacterium before Europeans arrived |
A 700-year-old mummy from the Bolivian Andes is quietly reshaping what scientists thought they knew about ancient diseases. Inside a single preserved tooth, researchers discovered genetic traces of Streptococcus pyogenes, the bacterium responsible for illnesses such as scarlet fever and strep throat. The remains date back to the 13th–14th century, a time long before Europeans…