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Please summarize Chapter 3 ("Evil Air") of the book 1493 by Charles Mann.

Chapter 3, "Evil Air," is about the effects of malaria in the New World. The disease became endemic in the New World, and Mann traces the consequences of malaria. As Mann writes, the disease "turned the Americas upside down" (page 103). Malaria caused high rates of mortality, and Mann states that the areas that were once the locations of high rates of malaria are still less well developed and poorer today, as Europeans used these areas as "extractive states" (page 103) from which to draw natural resources but not as areas in which to establish permanent institutions.


In the latter part of the chapter, Mann develops the argument that malaria was one of the reasons colonial America turned to slavery. After long relying on enslaving Native Americans and becoming an exporter rather than an importer of slaves, colonies such as Virginia turned to chattel slavery and the enslavement of Africans in part because malaria decimated Native American and white populations alike. While at first, colonies such as Virginia and what would become South Carolina relied on Native American labor and that of indentured servants, the effect of malaria on these populations resulted in the turn to enslaving Africans. While the exact date that malaria arrived in the New World is still debated, Mann believes that there is no doubt that malaria is "a historical force that deformed cultures" (page 116). 

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