Disease in ancient Egypt

The evidence for sickness in ancient Egypt may be divided into three categories:

skeletal and mummified remains
depictions of healing in formal art (rare)
manuscripts written in cursive hieroglyphs or in hieratic (a still more cursive script derived from hieroglyphs)

From the primary sources (the human remains) and the secondary or mediated sources (depictions and writings, mainly manuscripts), a range of diseases is known from ancient Egypt (Filer 1995; Nunn 1996):

eye diseases: prominent in healing manuscripts, as to be expected from the sand and dust of Saharan climate, but not detectable in depictions (note that the blind harpist may be an Egyptological concoction: images of singers with eyes closed may represent closing of eyes during singing, rather than permanent blindness)
illness caused by bites of scorpions or serpents: prominent in healing manuscripts, as to be expected in the Sahara; in the first millennium BC Horus stelae were produced to protect against the threat of such creatures
diseases affecting internal organs: difficult to detect even in well-preserved bodies
other internal diseases: kidney stones have been reported from examination of mummified remains
tuberculosis: several instances of spinal tuberculosis have been reported from human remains from Egypt, see Morse/Brothwell/Ucko 1964 (note that depictions of hump-backed individuals may be result of bad posture, or a disease other than spinal tuberculosis)
polio: an Amarna Period stela shows a man named Rema with emaciated leg, and leaning on a staff, and this is the principal evidence for the occurrence of polio (poliomyelitis), and Nunn suggests that this may also be the condition causing the abnormalities in the body of king Siptah of Dynasty 19
parasitic diseases: bilharzia (schistosomiasis), guinea-worm, roundworm, tapeworm

Some diseases leave no trace even in well-preserved bodies, and some may not have entered Egyptian vocabulary: in combination this creates a gap in the record.

Leprosy is not attested in ancient Egypt: a sixth century AD Christian burial in Nubia may be the earliest reported instance.

Plague may be the disease called in Egyptian healing manuscripts tA-nt-aAmw 'the Asiatic (disease)', but this is disputed; written sources also preserve the terms rnpt iAdt 'year of pestilence' connected with Sekhmet, the goddess who was the incarnation of divine anger. Roman Period manuscripts refer to measures taken by a member of temple staff, the priest of Sekhmet, to check meat and livestock, and to protect against contagion (Osing/Rosati 1998, cf Quack 2000).

References

Brothwell/Chiarelli 1973

See too the bibliography for recent studies of populations from grouped human remains carefully excavated.