The Meowing Nuns:
During the Middle Ages a nun in France for some reason just started to meow like a cat. The good people of France thought that maybe this noun had a mental break down and she just went crazy. But then more nouns within this area also started to meow like a cat. The nouns couldn’t seem to help themselves and the residents got really scared. Eventually the army was called in and the soldiers told the nuns that if they don’t stop they were going to hit them with whips. And after being threatened the nuns did stop. Making the residents wonder if these nuns were doing this on purpose. But many disagreed with that theory at that time as they believed that no servant of god would act like that out of their own free will.
Another very similar case happened in Germany when a nun just started to bite people. And shortly after this nun started to bite people the other nuns within this convent also started to bite people. Now the odd thing about this biting epidemic is it spread pretty far. First it spread to the nearby convents then it spread as far as Rome. They were thousands of nuns effected by this and they were just biting everybody, not only making people afraid of nuns but making many believe that this was a sign and the end of the world was coming.
The Dancing Plague Of Strasbourg:
One of the most famous cases of mass hysteria happened in France in 1518 when a women began to dance in a crowded street. This woman was dancing everywhere non stop and within a week 34 more people joined her and within a month there were about 400 people dancing. Now the nobles were very concerned and they wanted to get to the bottom of this so they hired local physicians to see what was causing this.
The physicians ruled out supernatural causes and they believed at the time that this was a plague and it was caused by a natural disease. They told the nobles that the only way to cure this strange diseases was to let them dance until they got it out of their systems. So they encouraged everybody to dance day and night and they even hired musicians and built a stage. In the end fifteen people died by strokes or heart attacks. Now did these people die because of some unknown illness that made them dance non stop. Or did they die because the physicians encouraged everybody to dance until this unknown plague was out of their system.
The Writing Tremor Epidemic:
In 1892 a young girls right hand began to tremble and overtime it started to get worse and eventually she started to have seizures. Now this illness or phenomena really scared the other students and not to long after more and more students started to experience the exact same symptoms, in total 19 students were effected. Then that very same year a similar illness effect 20 more students in Switzerland. Then 12 years later it returned effecting another 27 more students. And after a long investigation the doctors and scholars could not determine what was causing this. Making them believe that fear and mass hysteria was to blame. But could the power of the mind really be that strong. And this next case may prove that to be true.
Strawberries With Sugar:
Now in 2006 in Portugal there was or still is a very famous soap opera that every school girl in that region just loves to watch. And this show is called “Strawberry’s With Sugar”. Now in the soap opera there was an outbreak were these actors started to experience symptoms such as rashes, difficult breathing and dizziness. And right after this episode aired young girls all throughout Portugal started to experience the exact same symptoms and they were convinced that the too were sick. In total 300 girls in 14 different schools were effected. And some of these schools were even shut down. Now the Portuguese National Institute for Medical Emergency were quickly on the case but they couldn’t find anything wrong with these kids. They stated that this was a perfect example of Mass Hysteria.
The Great Coca Cola Scare:
In June 1999 students in Belgium started to feel ill after drinking coca cola. And since nearly 100 students claimed that this soft drink was the cause of their illness this story spread. And eventually thousands of people throughout Europe also claimed that after drinking Coca Cola that they too got sick. Even some countries put a temporary ban on this world famous soft drink until they could find out what was causing this as they did not want to take any chances. Now Coca cola is one of the biggest company’s in the world and they spent a lot of money to try to figure out what just what was going on here and in the end they couldn’t find anything wrong with their product. And this mass hysteria cost the coca cola company about 200 million dollars.
The Hindu Milk Miracle:
On September 21, 1995 a Hindu worshiper in New Delhi made his morning daily offering of milk to a statue of Lord Ganesha. But something very strange started to happened. It seemed that this milk was actually being drunk by this statue. And according to this Hindu it was an amazing sight to behold. Now word of this event spread very quickly and by mid morning every Hindu went to their closest temple and offered milk to the statue of lord Ganesha. And it seemed that these statues were also drinking the milk by way of the statues trunk. And this phenomena continued for several days. Now skeptics believe that this was nothing more then a textbook case of mass hysteria but due to the fact that so many people witnessed this phenomena it does make us wonder if something else, something unknown, something supernatural happened here in India on September 21, 1995
The Hollinwell Incident:
In 1980 an annual event was being held at the Hollinwell Showground. Around 500 children from 11 marching bands were in the show and while they were playing one of these young band members fainted, then another one, then another one, then whole groups of these young musicians started to faint. They were just dropping like fly’s. Then the people in the crowds also started to faint and overall hundreds of people were affected by this unknown phenomena or illness. One girl said it was like her arms and legs had no bones in them and she just got very dizzy and she blacked out. Other symptoms included vomiting sore eyes and sore throats. Now 259 people were taken to four nearby hospitals and even some of the horses were effected by this. Now this event was huge and doctors and scientist came in from all over and not one of them could explain why this happened. And the end conclusion was mass hysteria. Which to me doesn’t really make sense. I would assume that some unknown illness would be the cause, maybe some toxic wind blew in or something. But after checking every patent, the water supply, the air, anything you could imagine they tested and they couldn’t find anything that would cause these symptoms making this case something right out of the x files.
Mumbai Sweet Water:
Now this is a good one. In 2006 residents of Mumbai claimed that a creek that receives tons of raw sewage every single day had suddenly turned sweat. And within hours hundreds of people came to drink this water and they also brung tons of bottles so they could bring this sewage water home with them. Now the authorities were afraid for these people’s lives as they were drinking very toxic and contaminated water. So they patrolled the area and told everybody to go home and to not drink this water. And the next day the good people within this region said that this water was no longer sweet so they stopped drinking it. But it does make me wonder, even if this water somehow turned sweat why would you want to drink it. And thankfully there were no reported deaths or sickness after this event.
The Kissing Bug:
Now here is a perfect example of mass hysteria. In 1899 a reporter with the Washington post wrote an article about a bug that kisses you, and while its kissing you it poisons you and makes you very sick. Now that would be enough to terrify anybody. But the reporter didn’t stop there he also stated that this kissing bug was going to start a new plague. Now right after this article was released everybody in America started to crazy they were terrified and anybody that got any type of bug bite on their face thought that they were sick or they thought that they were going to die by the plague.
People were walking in the streets covered in bandages from head to toe hoping that these bandages would protect them from the kissing bug. And many of those who thought that they were kissed by this bug wanted financial assistance as they said they were just to sick to work. Now this fear of the kissing bug almost stopped the entire country as nobody wanted to go outside. But thankfully not to long after this article was published it was dismissed as a hoax and everything did returned back to normal , some locations longer then others.
Tanganyika Laughter Epidemic:
In 1962 at a mission run boarding school for girls in Tanzania 3 girls just started to laugh for no reason. And the more these girls laughed the more it spread. And a couple of hours later more than half the school was effected by this laughing plague. Now laughing is contagious but whats really strange about this case is some of these girls laughed for weeks they just couldn’t stop. So the principle decided to shut the school down in hopes of containing whatever this was. But all that did was make things worse as the girls were free to roam so it just kept spreading. Even the nearby villages had to close their schools as their students also started to laugh. Now for some reason this only effected young girls and in some rare cases young boys ruling out any type of chemical or toxin. Now there are so many documented stories of mass hysteria and a lot of these cases are just so bizarre making it hard for anyone to believe that our minds are that powerful.
Until next time this is paranormal junkie. Make sure to hit that subscribe button and stay tuned!