> Within Baghdad, the Al-Adudi Hospital's location was decided upon by its administrator, Abu-Bakr al-Razi. He determined where it should be located by "hanging a piece of meat in several places for a few days and deciding in favor of the place where meat was found to be least infected."

That is actually quite a clever idea. I wonder what factors would lead to one location having higher microbe density than others? Probably things like nearby sewers, meat / fish markets, etc.