# The Laughing Sickness: Medicine’s Strangest Cold Case

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/mysteries-and-histories-1576928/the-laughing-sickness-medicine-s-strangest-cold-case
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/mysteries-and-histories-1576928/the-laughing-sickness-medicine-s-strangest-cold-case.md
Podcast: [Mysteries and Histories](https://stenobird.com/podcast/mysteries-and-histories-1576928)
Published: 2026-08-03T11:30:01+00:00
Episode link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/georgiamariexo/episodes/The-Laughing-Sickness-Medicines-Strangest-Cold-Case-e3mt9nu
Audio file: https://traffic.megaphone.fm/APO1126678033.mp3
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JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/mysteries-and-histories-1576928/episodes/the-laughing-sickness-medicine-s-strangest-cold-case
Duration seconds: 1387

## Resource

In the isolated highlands of Papua New Guinea, a strange and horrifying disease spread through entire villages, leaving women and children trembling, stumbling, and erupting into sudden fits of laughter before wasting away to death. For years, no one knew what was killing them, and the answer turned out to be far more disturbing than anyone expected: a fatal prion disease tied to one of the greatest human taboos.

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## Transcript

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