History Main / InstantIllness

* [[DefiedTrope Defied]] by the [[MagicAIsMagicA rules of]] the eponymous ''Manga/DeathNote''. While the Death Note can cause fatal diseases, there needs to be enough time for it to realistically develop. If the set time is too tight, it won't happen and the victim will die of the standard heart attack. Since all deaths must occur within 23 days of a name writing, leaving the disease unspecified will randomly pick one that works. However if the disease is named but the time of death is not, the 23-day rule won't take effect and the person will die of that disease even if it takes longer.

* [[DefiedTrope Defied]] by the [[MagicAIsMagicA rules of]] the eponymous ''Manga/DeathNote''. While the Death Note can cause fatal diseases, there needs to be enough time for it to realistically develop. If the set time is too tight, it won't happen and the victim will die of the standard heart attack. Since all deaths must occur within 23 days of a name writing, this severely limits what disease can be used, though leaving it unspecified will randomly pick one that works.

%% Image selected per crowner in the Image Suggestion thread: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/crowner.php?crowner_id=s6jfhdo5
%% https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1452266899092104700
%% Please do not replace or remove without starting a new thread.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* At the start of the android arc of ''Anime/DragonBallZ'', [[KidFromTheFuture Trunks]] came back in time to both warn the Z Fighters about their upcoming battle with the androids and to give Goku medicine for a heart disease that killed him before the fight in the initial timeline. When the androids do show up, Goku enters the fight completely healthy but then quickly succumbs to the disease and needs to be taken home (he didn't take the medicine because he didn't feel sick). Granted, fighting for your life ''would'' put a significant strain on your heart, which would have aggravated the condition, but considering he had no symptoms ''at all'' until the fight began, it falls into this trope.

[[folder:Comics]]

* In [[https://www.wattpad.com/69903466-mork-mindy this]] unnamed ''Series/MorkAndMindy'' fanfiction, Mork goes from healthy to feverish in a few minutes. Then again, he ''is'' an alien.

* In ''Seasons of The Heart'', the narrator/protagonist is a woman whose two young daughters died of cholera. In describing the tragedy, she says that just hours before they died, they were by all appearances perfectly healthy, running around picking wildflowers. They fell ill mid-afternoon, and both were gone by the next morning. She even {{lampshade|hanging}}s it a bit, beginning the story by saying, "There was no illness that extinguished the flame of life as swiftly as cholera." {{Justified|Trope}} as this one is TruthInTelevision: depending on the strain, cholera actually can be that lethal, and given the setting (mid to late 1800s, somewhere along the Oregon Trail), the chances that they could even ''get'' them to a doctor before it was too late would be fairly slim (unless they happened to be fortunate enough to have a doctor in their wagon party) -- and even if they did, reliable treatments for cholera hadn't been created yet, so it's questionable whether a doctor would have been able to do anything for them anyway.
* Towards the end of ''Film/FleshAndBlood1985'', pieces of a dog that died of plague are launched into the besieged castle in the night. One of the pieces ends up in the well. The mercenaries who have taken over the castle drink some water in the morning and start showing symptoms before they finish breakfast.

* On ''{{Series/Bones}}'', Arastoo gets sick very quickly from a genetically modified virus when he pricks his finger on a needle embedded in the victim’s arm. It likely took a little time to get all the equipment set up where they were treating him, but it’s obvious it’s still the same day, with maybe an hour or so passing. By a couple hours later, he’s almost dead. Only finding the killer and getting the antidote saves him. Although the virus was genetically engineered, it still moved faster than many real pathogens.

* Eugene Ionesco's ''Jeux de Massacre'' (translated to English under the title ''The Killing Game'') takes this [[ExaggeratedTrope to the extreme]] with its story of a sudden epidemic of an unknown disease that causes previously-healthy people to drop dead in a matter of minutes. As with many of his plays, Ionesco uses this framework to explore the human condition, in this case how humans react to chaotic or frightening situations on a mass scale.

* {{Parodied|Trope}} by ''Creator/TheFiresignTheatre'' in the game show "Beat the Reaper". The contestant is infected with a deadly disease and has less than a minute to use the ensuing symptoms to guess the disease, get the treatment, and beat the reaper.

* In ''VideoGame/SkoolDaze'', there is an event where a student has the mumps and you must avoid all physical contact with him for the duration of break-time (a few minutes). If he does touch you, you instantly develop mumps and get sent home, ending the game.

* In the CD ROM version of ''VideoGame/TheOregonTrail'' anyone who catches a bad cold will instantaneously spread it through the entire wagon party on the same day they catch it. Punctuated by a sneeze every single time another party member gets it.
* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'': FOXDIE is a SyntheticPlague that spreads to and kills susceptible targets in a matter of minutes.

** ''WesternAnimation/KatieAndOrbie'': in ''Chicken Pox Party'', Katie suddenly starts to itch and breaks out in spots in the middle of the afternoon of Halloween.
** ''Literature/MillyMolly'': In "Spots and Stripes", Milly gets chicken pox. She doesn't get it gradually, she just wakes up showing all the symptoms.
** ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'': Zigzagged in "Arthur's Chicken Pox". Arthur's chicken pox comes on gradually, with him having a [[FeverDreamEpisode fever hallucination]] in art class and needing to go see the school nurse well before the spots appear, but at the end of the episode D.W. just wakes up with spots all over.

* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls1998'': In "Gesundfight," the Amoeba Boys' illness spreads across Townsville within a single morning, and we see several characters become ill as soon as they make contact with another infected person. It's later explained the Amoeba Boys's single-cell anatomy mixed with the virus to make it more infectious.
* Played for horror in ''WesternAnimation/Primal2019'': in "Plague of Madness," a mild-mannered ''Argentinosaurus'' is bitten by a ''Hadrosaur'' infected with [[TheVirus some kind of zombie-like disease]]. Seconds after being bitten, the ''Argentinosaurus'' turns a sickly green and starts [[BloodFromTheMouth vomiting blood]]; the disease then causes it to go completely berserk and slaughter ''its entire herd''. [[FromBadToWorse And then Spear and Fang happen upon the grisly scene]]... Spear also has a NightmareSequence where it successfully bites him and Fang, which causes them to ''immediately'' start rotting away.

* Eugene Ionesco's ''Jeux de Massacre'' (''The Killing Game'' in English translations) takes this [[ExaggeratedTrope to the extreme]] with its story of a sudden epidemic of an unknown disease that causes previously-healthy people to drop dead in a matter of minutes. As with many of his plays, Ionesco uses this framework to explore the human condition, in this case how humans react to chaotic or frightening situations on a mass scale.

[[quoteright:350:[[Literature/SickSimon https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/instant_sick.png]]]]
%%

[[quoteright:350:[[Literature/SickSimon https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/instantsick.png]]]]