The Haunting Abandoned Island In The Middle Of NYC

Typhoid And The Island

Typhoid, unlike smallpox, is a peculiar disease that breeds a much smaller amount of casualties; although it kills 10% of victims or more if left untreated. It is caused by a particular strain of the salmonella bacteria called salmonella typhi.

Most people when infected with salmonella typhi become sick shortly afterwards. They develop a fever (typhoid fever from which the disease takes its name) and then a rash followed by a wide-range of fairly unpleasant complications. Assuming that the person makes it through three weeks of infection, then it is likely that the disease will be beaten off by the body’s immune system and the victim will return to health. However, there are some rare people that don’t get sick from salmonella typhi.

The Island’s Most Infamous Resident, Typhoid Mary

Mary Mallon didn’t get sick from salmonella typhi. Instead, she found herself as an asymptomatic carrier of the disease. What that means is that Mary would never get sick from typhoid but was able to infect other people by passing on her infection.

She became known as “Typhoid Mary” for the large numbers of people that she infected in New York while working as a cook. She refused to believe that she was responsible for the outbreaks and she was eventually forcibly quarantined on North Brother Island for more than 20 years after refusing to stop working as a cook.