Final answer:
It is true that Native Americans suffered greatly from diseases brought by Europeans due to lack of immunity. Devastating illnesses like smallpox, influenza, and measles led to widespread mortality, as indigenous populations had no prior exposure to such diseases.
Step-by-step explanation:
The statement that sickness spread quickly because Native Americans had no immunity to European diseases is true. When Europeans arrived in the Americas, they carried with them diseases such as smallpox, influenza, and measles. Native American populations suffered catastrophic losses because they had never been exposed to these diseases and had no natural resistance or immunity developed over centuries, as the Europeans did. Infectious diseases introduced by Europeans, coupled with secondary factors like malnutrition induced by European disruption of native agriculture, caused rapid and widespread mortality among the indigenous peoples of the Americas.
For example, the indigenous population of Hispaniola experienced a decline from over a million people in 1492 to only 500 by 1548. This was a direct result of the devastation by diseases, to which they had no immunity. The lack of previous exposure to illnesses typical in Europe and associated with livestock such as pigs, sheep, and cows, meant that the arrival of Europeans introduced a vast array of new and deadly microbes to the Native American populations.
The situation was further exacerbated by European practices such as slave raids and allowed livestock to roam, which caused disruption in the native way of life, contributing to malnutrition and weakening the ability of indigenous peoples to resist disease. As a result, diseases spread even faster among bodies weakened by other infections or by lack of food, causing a domino effect of death and devastation.