14/04/2026
In Russia, it was called the Polish disease;
In Poland, it was the Turkish disease;
Turks called it the Christian disease.
Doctors call it the great imitator.
Our rural population call it the “city disease”.
In South Africa it is “vuilsiekte”: the dirty disease.
Syphilis.
It seems it is never the fault of one’s own country, or its people. There must be someone else to blame, another nationality, ethnicity, the other sexual partner. It can’t be us.
The instinct to find a scapegoat is core to human nature: “othering”. We need someone to blame, especially if the victim is marginalised by society, whether through nationality, ethnicity or social class:
🕎 Diabetes was once called a Jewish disease (by the Americans);
👣 Plague was blamed on Blacks living in District Six (actually caused by the British);
💰 TB was said to be caused by the poor (TB is caused by poverty, NOT the poor).
Older “treatments” for Syphilis included a public whipping at the hospital, on admission and discharge. For 500 years Mercury was the extremely toxic and barbaric treatment for Syphilis. It was felt moral degenerates who contracted Syphilis, deserved painful humiliating treatment.
Victims were mocked for this shameful “venereal” disease, named after Venus, the goddess of love: “One night with Venus, is followed by a lifetime with Mercury”.
In 2026, much has changed. Penicillin is an effective treatment, resulting in less serious tertiary disease. And less deaths.
But Syphilis is still a disease shrouded in social stigma: it either results in the denialist blame game described above. Or a paralysing shame.
The result is the same: unnecessary delay in effective treatment.
At Be Part, we have run an award-winning weekly After Hours Clinic. A free service to our community. We have managed 16 000 clients the past 17 years.
And treated 500 Syphilis patients the past year alone.
They have all been treated effectively.
And with dignity.
