Happy Indigenous Peoples' Day! When we celebrate their elimination by our diseases.

According to AI: An estimated 90–95% of the Indigenous population in the Americas died from diseases introduced by Europeans, totaling tens of millions of people.
The arrival of Europeans in the Americas brought epidemics of smallpox, influenza, measles, typhus, and other infectious diseases, which devastated Indigenous populations who had no prior exposure or immunity. Scholars estimate that between 40 and 60 million people across North and South America died from disease alone, though estimates vary depending on pre-contact population figures, which range from 8 million to over 100 million
In what is now the United States and Canada, roughly 5 to 15 million Indigenous people perished due to disease
Regional impacts were severe: in Mexico, Central, and South America, waves of disease caused mortality rates of 50–80% in some areas during the 16th century
The combination of densely populated societies, trade networks, and lack of immunity made these populations particularly vulnerable. Diseases often spread faster than European settlers themselves, reaching remote communities and causing catastrophic population declines.
Historical context shows that disease was the single largest factor in Indigenous depopulation