COVID-19: Just Another of Many Pandemics

COVID-19 has grown to 180 countries and regions. It covers more than  44,000 suffers so far, but this is not the first time a pandemic has happened.

Data show that the virus is moderate in 80% of sufferers, hard in just 13%, and severe in only 6%. Vital signs and indications of COVID-19 include pains, dry cough, weakness, fever, running nose, shortness of breath, and sore throat. The symptoms can vary from different cases, so that it is pretty hard to indicate the general picture of the illness.

After China has announced some pneumonia incidents on December 31, 2019, named a new virus on January 7, 2020, and the first death there happened on January 11, 2020, COVID-19 began spreading like wildfire to neighboring nations and then all over the world.               

Historical Facts

Approximately 5000 years ago, an epidemic cleared out a prehistoric village in China, now named Hamin Manga. They slaughtered lots of people, both young and old. There is also historical data and evidence for other plagues and illnesses, such as the Plague of Athens in 430 BC, the Antonine Plague from 165-180 AD, the Plague of Cyprian from 250-271 AD, the Plague of Justinian from 541-542 AD, the Black Death from 1346-1353, the Cocoliztli Epidemic from 1545-1548, the American Plagues in 16th century, and others.                                                  

From 1918-1920, the Spanish Flu was the most challenging pandemic in modern history. The H1N1 flu virus has made it with genes of avian origin. It is expected that about 500 million people, or one-third of the world’s culture, became contaminated with this virus, and about 675,000 vanished in the United States, and at least 50 million died worldwide.

In February 1957, a new influenza A virus named H2N2 emerged in East Asia, spreading another pandemic declared Asian Flu. This was first published in Singapore, then Hong Kong, and then later in the United States. H2N2 caused about 1.1 million deaths worldwide and 116,000 in the United States.                       

In 1968, H3N2 Influenza, an infection, created another global pandemic. First regarded in the United States, this pandemic caused over 1 million deaths worldwide and about 100,000 deaths in the United States, mostly in sufferers 65 years and older.

Disease Affection

In 2003, the SARS coronavirus (SARS-CoV) was recognized. There were about 8000 cases in 26 countries. This virus is thought to have started in 2002 in the Guangdong region of Southern China in animals, possibly bats, which then grew to civet cats and then to humans.

In 2009, the H1N1 virus (pdm09) developed, also announced as the Swine Flu, and it was first discovered in the United States and then immediately spread all over the world. This new H1N1 virus, which included a unique combination of influenza genes not before recognized in animals or people affected by more than 60 million people in the United States, resulting in 274,000 hospitalizations and 12,469 losses. The CDC concluded that more than 500,000 people perished worldwide after being affected.                                                                                                       

Pandemic Decrease

From 2014-2016, there were about 28,000 samples of West African Ebola worldwide, and 11,000 people went. The Zika Virus spread in 2015 from Central and South America and currently proceeds to spread around the earth.                                                                                                         

Whatever the origins of these various pandemics, illness and deaths generated by such viruses have changed the course of history, and at times, have come adjacent to indicating the end of human progress.

Although we are able to prevent many of these illnesses because of the prosperous medical and technological improvements, the COVID-19 crisis is showing that tutorings learned now and from the past will allow us to be more active and better outfitted to deal with pandemics in the near future.