Laughter is a healthy and beautiful thing, but if it lasts for weeks and months, and affects hundreds of children across tens of kilometers and no one can stop it, things become serious and need treatment, and for those who do not believe, this is the story of the infectious laughter that broke out on January 30, 1962 in the orphanage school In the village of Kashasha, in the former Tanganyika which is the mainland part of present-day Tanzania.
And according to the French magazine Le Point, the story began in a school playground, when 3 young girls burst out laughing and could no longer control it, so they writhed and shouted joy and rolled on the ground, then started laughing again, before the laughter moved on to the other students. Then to other schools in the country.
The teachers realized that something strange was going on, and they started to worry and then tried to bring the pupils to their senses, to stop the hysterical laughter that immediately turned into horror when the children turned violent.
Depending on the nature of the child, the seizures last from a few minutes to a few hours, after which it stops and then resumes after a while, and this lasted for 16 days for some, although the children, when asked, could not explain the reason for their laughter, as the magazine reported.
It is strange - as the magazine says - that this epidemic did not affect the five teachers, and on March 18, 6 weeks after the outbreak of the crisis, and hysterical laughter continued among the students, the authorities were forced, without understanding anything of what was happening, to close the institution and return the orphans. to their villages, after 95 of the 159 students in the school were affected.
Mass hysteria
However, sending people infected with this disease to their families only led to the spread of the epidemic, which reached the village of Nchamba, 80 kilometers away, and infected about 217 young men of both sexes in the following two months, but adults remained immune from infection, except for those who are not educated. Troy magazine.
After Nchamba, the impact of laughter spread to another village in the region, and students continued to be sent home, which increased the spread of hysteria, and the authorities no longer knew what to do, so blood samples taken from children were sent to Europe for analysis, but without finding any toxic substance No viruses, nothing in the drinking water or in the food.
It remains only for everyone to admit - according to the magazine - that this region of Tanganyika has fallen victim to mass hysteria for which no cure is known except patience, as the epidemic began to recede on its own after 6 months, and the students regained their seriousness and returned to the 14 schools that were closed.