Margaret
Margaret asked Lois McMaster Bujold:

Is the "bruising fever" in The Physicians of Vilnoc based on a particular disease in our world, or did you invent one with the characteristics (symptoms, mode of transmission, etc.) that you needed for the story?

Lois McMaster Bujold
I invented it, including the blue horseflies, although it is informed by details from several real-world diseases -- insect-borne ones like sleeping sickness, yellow fever, and malaria, bruising in the extremities like bubonic, and so on. One is spoiled for choice of sources for unpleasant symptoms. I also had a physician test-reader vet it for physiological plausibility.

Ta, L.

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