Disease is one of the five main city problems in Frostpunk 2, the others being Hunger, Cold, Squalor, and Crime. High Disease levels reduce your available workforce and raise tension, so it’s important to prevent and cure Disease as much as possible.
One of the fundamental principles of modern health care is that prevention is better than cure—and this is absolutely true in Frostpunk 2 as well. The best way to deal with the problems of disease and sickness is to prevent them from happening in the first place. But this isn’t always possible, so there are also ways to cure the sick. In this guide, I’m going to cover methods for both the prevention and the cure of disease.
How to prevent Disease in Frostpunk 2
The first thing you need to know about Disease in Frostpunk 2 is that it’s caused by three of the other five main city problems: Hunger, Cold, and Squalor. When any or all of those three increase, so does Disease. If you make sure your people are warm, fed, and living and working in decent conditions, then you usually won’t have to worry about Disease.
If you’re not sure why your people are getting sick, hover over the Disease icon on the main screen (the one that looks like a syringe), and you’ll get a tooltip listing all of the factors that are increasing Disease in whichever settlement you’re currently viewing. If you want to prevent Disease, then addressing the worst of these factors should be your first priority.
You can also directly decrease Disease levels by researching specific technologies and building specific buildings. The bottom-left section of the Society tab on the Idea Tree is dedicated to healthcare technologies. Asylum technologies aren’t useful against Disease, but Hospitals, Treatment, and Pharmaceuticals all are. Within each category, there are various options, but as a general rule, the more effective a building is at countering Disease, the worse its trade-offs are.
There are also various laws you can pass and decisions you can make that either increase or decrease Disease. I wouldn’t recommend choosing the “decrease Disease” option every time as there are always trade-offs. But do prioritize Disease prevention often enough to keep your Disease levels under control and your workforce healthy.
How to cure disease in Frostpunk 2
Preventing Disease in Frostpunk 2 is easier said than done, and it’s pretty much inevitable that some of your people are going to get down with the sickness from time to time. But generally speaking, prevention isn’t just better than cure, prevention is also the best cure. If your people are getting sick, then take steps to reduce Disease levels, and the sick will get cured naturally over time. Every Hospital you build not only helps lower Disease levels, but also cures sick people at an accelerated rate. So, if you’ve got a lot of sick people and you want to get them back to work in a hurry, build a new hospital or two—if you can find enough healthy workforce to staff it, that is.
