Tidbit from the Beit Midrash

Irony: The Essenes (the 2000-year-old Jewish sect that produced the Dead Sea Scrolls) were quite fastidious about issues pertaining to ritual cleanliness. Apparently they used to visit the mikvah in order to purify themselves following each bowel movement. Naturally, the bathwater was not the most hygienic. Modern scholars theorize that mikvah-related infectious illness might have been a major killer in the Essene community.