Europeans vie for territory in the region and spread diseases among the tribal population.

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Those diseases, including small pox and influenza, had devastating effects on indigenous populations throughout the Americas, including the Coast Salish peoples.

Some diseases were introduced intentionally.

It is estimated that by the mid 1800s, two thirds of the natives of the Pacific Northwest had died from small pox, influenza, and malaria.

Read more about the European incursion in the Pacific Northwest generally, about disease epidemics among the Coast Salish peoples, and the 1770s smallpox epidemic in Puget Sound.