Why did many slaves die during the journey on the slave ship?

Answer 1

Slaves died on slave ships for many reasons. First, these people were packed into a ship with hardly any room between them. In such conditions, bacteria and germs spread rapidly and many died from illness passed from person to person. Second, on the slave ships, slaves were denied many common necessities. They were not regularly fed or given fresh water on the boat. Those who died sometimes weren't discarded from the ship for days so a rotting carcass was among the living people, spreading disease even quicker. For those who did get sick, there was no doctor or medication to treat them. the people taking them over (French, American, European, I don't know which country you mean) have different types of illnesses the slaves were never exposed to, making it much more dangerous as their bodies had no defense toward it. The ship owners weren't usually the nicest of people and often shot, hung, or threw slaves overboard for frivolous reasons These are some reasons many slaves died on the ships. A lot of times, the women would be shackled around the ankles and hung upside down while they were being raped by the slavers. The slave berths were four feet by eighteen inches, and they would be filled with urine, feces, and other bodily toxins in about three days. This also killed a lot of innocent people on the passage to America or Jamaica.