Plasmodium falciparum
Plasmodium falciparum is a unicellular protozoan parasite of humans, and the deadliest species of "Plasmodium" that cause malaria in humans. It is transmitted through the bite of a female "Anopheles" mosquito. It is responsible for roughly 50% of all malaria cases. It causes the disease's most dangerous form called falciparum malaria. It is therefore regarded as the deadliest parasite in humans, causing 435,000 deaths in 2017. It is also associated with the development of blood cancer (Burkitt's lymphoma) and is classified as Group 2A carcinogen.
Disease in colonial America
Yellow Fever was a disease that caused thousands of deaths, and many people to flee the afflicted areas. It begins with a headache, backache, and fever making the patient extremely sick from the start, and gets its name from the yellow color of the skin, which develops in the third day of the illness. At the end of one week, the afflicted person is either dead or recovering. Yellow Fever is transmitted by mosquitoes, when it bites an infected person it carries several thousand infective doses of the disease making it a carrier for life passing it from human to human.