Effects Of The Columbian Exchange

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The Columbian Exchange was extremely important to the New World and Old World during 1492. It was the exchange of new foods, diseases, and ideas. These foods would help people live healthier and longer, the diseases would kill out a lot of the population, and the ideas would advance trading and money making. This would make the Americas as we know them today a strong country. The New World provided soils that were suitable for cultivation for Old World products, like sugar and coffee, and because of this they could increase their supply and lower the prices to the people. The production of these products resulted in large profits back to Europe, which had fueled the Industrial Revolution in Europe. They also gained new crops such as potatoes, chili peppers, tomatoes, and tobacco. This would help the people in ways they had no idea of. People were becoming healthier because of these foods and the nutrients they contained, and tobacco soon became very popular. Crops like sugar cane and coffee fueled the demand for more labor; this started the transatlantic slave trade. Last but not least the diseases that that killed off many Indians and Europeans. The soil was very important to the cops in the Old Word. The New World has well enriched soil that was suitable for …show more content…

Europeans brought many deadly viruses over to the Americas. Such as: smallpox, measles, typhus, bubonic plague, malaria and cholera. Native Americans had no immunities to these diseases and bacteria because they had not been exposed to it before this time of exchange. This killed off many of the Native population about eighty to ninety percent in the first one-hundred to one-hundred and fifty years. The Native Indians also had a disease they passed on called syphilis. Biologist Irwin Sherman (2007) lists venereal syphilis as one of the twelve diseases that changed the world. Within five years of arrival to Europe the disease was an