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When hysteria takes hold, reason often goes out the window... Join us as we explore the most notorious cases of mass psychosis throughout history! Our countdown includes dancing plagues, fictional diseases becoming real, mysterious attackers, and supernatural encounters that drove entire communities to the brink of madness.
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00:00I came over to see what was going on.
00:02Children started laughing.
00:05Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're exploring the most notorious times in history
00:09when people experienced cases believed to be mass hysteria,
00:12psychological epidemics, or unusual phenomena that caused them to question their sanity.
00:17Within a week, another 34 people were dancing.
00:21The soap opera virus.
00:23In 2006, a mysterious illness swept through teenagers in Portugal,
00:27with symptoms such as rashes, difficulty breathing, and dizziness.
00:30The disease seemed to be highly infectious as it spread through several schools,
00:34affecting more than 300 students and strangely no adults.
00:37However, rather than the cause being an unknown virus, there was another reason.
00:44The first case was recorded days after a particular episode of the Portuguese teen soap opera
00:50Morengos com Azúcar aired.
00:52During it, a life-threatening disease with the same symptoms engulfed the on-screen school.
00:57It's thought that viewers underwent mass psychogenic illness,
01:03believing they'd also been infected by the fictional disease.
01:06It's speculated that stress from the students preparing for approaching year-end tests
01:10also played a major factor.
01:12The face of pure evil.
01:20In 2018, a malevolent force was seemingly calling the SMK Kedera School in Kelantin, Malaysia,
01:26its home.
01:27Students saw a black figure in a face of pure evil, causing them to shriek in terror and even faint.
01:32When the quiet in the air was suddenly shattered by a schoolgirl's piercing scream.
01:37And then another scream rang out.
01:41And another.
01:42As more and more of them saw the creatures screaming echoed across the building,
01:46causing teachers and students to barricade classrooms.
01:49Within a day, nearly 40 people had seen the monster.
01:51Despite Islamic spiritual healers arriving to perform prayers,
02:00it was determined that there was no monster, and it was instead a case of mass hysteria.
02:04The school increased its security in the aftermath, including changing staff,
02:07to help prevent this terrifying event from repeating.
02:10The Monkey Man of Delhi.
02:12In 2001, Delhi, India was in chaos as the monkey man stalked the community.
02:16It didn't have any marks or anything.
02:18It was just hairy and black.
02:19With hundreds of sightings, the creature would attack people at night
02:22as they slept on the roofs of their buildings to escape the summer heat.
02:25The monkey man would leave many scratches on its victims before fleeing.
02:28However, the witness accounts of what it looked like varied wildly.
02:31Sometimes it had metal claws, a helmet, or even used roller skates.
02:34Around 2 or 3 in the morning, there were noises outside.
02:39I went downstairs.
02:41When I was on the stairs, he came out and grabbed me.
02:44The fear of the monkey man even resulted in deaths
02:46as around 2 people lost their lives upon fleeing the creature.
02:49The only known large primate in the area that could be responsible is the gibbon.
02:54There was even a report that a mob killed a man whom they suspected was the monster.
02:58Yet rather than a creature, mass hysteria was declared as the source.
03:02The Mad Gasser of Mattoon.
03:03In 1944, the residents of Mattoon, Illinois, believed the sinister assailant was in their midst.
03:09This person, armed with a pesticide sprayer, would spread an unknown gas into homes.
03:13When people smelled the sweet scent, they began experiencing severe symptoms,
03:19including coughing, vomiting, and leg paralysis.
03:22Thankfully, the symptoms eventually vanished.
03:24Yet the M.O. of the Mad Gasser became more intense
03:26as reports that they'd broken into homes emerged.
03:29Within a couple of weeks after the police previously mentioned mass hysteria as a possible cause,
03:39they went further by declaring that the gas was potentially coming from nearby industrial
03:42buildings that used chemicals.
03:44This declaration seemingly coincided with the Gasser's attacks stopping,
03:48leading to evidence that this was likely mass hysteria.
03:51As scientific understanding and technological advances continue to steadily progress,
03:56it seems like mysterious happenings such as the Mad Gasser of Mattoon
03:59have become less and less prevalent.
04:02The Sri Lanka Epidemic.
04:04In 2012, something strange emerged from a school in Gampala, Sri Lanka.
04:09In one day, 1,100 students began showing symptoms of an allergic reaction,
04:13including coughing, skin rashes, and vomiting.
04:16Hundreds were sent home after getting medical treatment,
04:18while many had to stay at the hospital for further aid.
04:20To make it more terrifying, the epidemic spread rapidly.
04:24Within a week, 15 schools reported similar incidents,
04:26resulting in around 1,900 cases, including five teachers.
04:30Officials began testing various possible sources in the schools.
04:33However, medical staff found the patients showed signs of their symptoms being psychological,
04:38leading to the belief that it was likely mass hysteria.
04:41Murder of Bridget Cleary.
04:42In 1895, Bridget Cleary was in dire straits in Ballyvadle, Republic of Ireland.
04:47She helped finance the family through selling eggs, through making clothes, things like that.
04:54She'd come down with a disease believed to be bronchitis, tuberculosis, or another similar ailment.
04:59Bridget's recovery looked unlikely as a priest came to perform the last rites.
05:03However, this wasn't what took her life.
05:05Instead, her husband Michael had convinced several people, including her own father,
05:09that Bridget wasn't Bridget.
05:10Instead, she'd been abducted by a fairy and an imposter had taken her place.
05:14And he decided that he would exorcise the fairy changeling from his beloved wife.
05:20It's believed that Michael and his accomplices burned Bridget to death,
05:23as well as others involved being criminally charged.
05:26Michael was sentenced to 20 years for manslaughter.
05:29It's speculated he had cop grass syndrome,
05:31a disorder where a person believes someone has been replaced by an imposter.
05:35127 years after Bridget Cleary's death,
05:38the children in Tipperary may still be heard singing a nursery rhyme.
05:44Are you a witch or are you a fairy?
05:46Or are you the wife of Michael Clary?
05:50The Tanganyika laughter epidemic.
05:52Usually the sound of children laughing is joyful, but not in this case.
05:58What's funny?
06:00Hmm?
06:01Come on, spit it out!
06:02In 1962, at an all-girls village boarding school in Tanganyika,
06:06now known as Tanzania,
06:07kids began laughing in class.
06:09This continued for hours,
06:10sometimes up to 16 days,
06:12which understandably caused many victims to cry from the pain
06:15and fear of constant chuckling.
06:17After 95 students,
06:18the majority of the school began laughing uncontrollably.
06:21The facility was forced to close.
06:23Yet the epidemic then spread,
06:24causing around 1,000 students within 14 schools to have symptoms.
06:28The laughter would spread from village to village
06:30until thousands of people were laughing in Tanzania and Uganda.
06:35The Ground Zero School was reportedly sued by families affected by the spread.
06:39However, it's believed that instead of a disease,
06:41mass hysteria sparked by stress from Tanganyika gaining independence
06:44the previous year was responsible.
06:50The Havana Syndrome.
06:52In 2017, reports emerged that sent shockwaves through world governments.
06:56From 2016, several diplomatic staff and their families based in Cuba
07:00reported symptoms including dizziness, headaches, and cognitive problems.
07:04Seemingly before the symptoms,
07:05the victims heard a grating sound or felt pressure in their heads.
07:08The recording gives us the first tangible sense of what it was like
07:11for these American government workers in Havana
07:13who were hearing these unexplained sounds in their residences
07:17and later developed physical symptoms.
07:19By 2022, it was believed that over 1,000 people had experienced Havana Syndrome,
07:23including those stationed in other countries beyond Cuba.
07:26This led to the belief by some that the diplomats were being attacked
07:28with some kind of sound weapon.
07:30You won't be hearing it, but of course it is going into your system.
07:33It's like an acoustic hammer which is hitting you.
07:37You're just not able to hear it because its frequency is much higher.
07:40There were even recordings released of the apparent sound.
07:42However, they were later dismissed as noise caused by insects.
07:46Governmental reports have stated a purposeful attack was very unlikely,
07:49pointing the finger towards possibly mass hysteria.
07:51We're going to continue to do a comprehensive examination of the effects here that we're seeing
07:57and the potential causes of AHI.
08:00That's something that we're going to continue to look into.
08:02The Dancing Plague of 1518.
08:04Apparently, not all fairy tales are make-believe.
08:06In this case, there are similarities with Hans Christian Andersen's The Red Shoes.
08:10In 1518 in Strasbourg, in modern-day France,
08:20a mother and daughter began dancing on the streets without any music.
08:23Things got even stranger when the manic dancing began to spread.
08:27Soon up to 400 people joined.
08:29However, the victims couldn't stop, even in horrible pain.
08:32While it's disputed, some accounts claim up to 15 people a day perished from the mania.
08:36After medical help didn't work, the authorities believed the possession had taken place
08:40and tried to combat it.
08:41Within a couple of months, the mania stopped.
08:43It's speculated that on top of mass hysteria,
08:45the incident might have happened due to ergot poisoning,
08:47a type of fungus that grows on rye and similar plants.
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09:16The Salem Witch Trials
09:18Over three centuries later, the city of Salem, Massachusetts
09:21hasn't been able to shake off this dark history.
09:24Any place that has had a mass killing or murder usually becomes very haunted.
09:32Beginning in 1692 and lasting over a year,
09:35over 200 people in the community were accused of partaking in witchcraft
09:38and putting spells on their neighbors.
09:40I saw Bridget Bishop with the devil!
09:42Around 30 people were executed or imprisoned after a trial.
09:45After the saga ended, years later, several of the accusers admitted they'd lie.
09:49As such, it's believed this is one of the most infamous cases of mass hysteria in the U.S.
09:53It's also been linked to ergot poisoning,
09:55which can cause hallucinations, psychosis,
09:57and a sensation of crawling under the skin.
10:00Experiencing these symptoms, this may have sparked the accusers
10:03to feel as though they'd been bewitched by someone using magic.
10:06What happened here in Salem is what actually what created the path for our modern legal system.
10:12Innocent people being convicted and killed for crimes that they didn't commit.
10:20Have you ever been swept away and into an incident of mass hysteria?
10:23Let us know below.
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