History of Pandemic: Timeline, Death Toll and other details

History of Pandemic

History of pandemic witnessed millions of deaths. Disease and illnesses have plagued humanity since the earliest days of civilization. Inventions, technological advancements and globalization have made the world very small in terms of reach and communication. Globalization created new opportunities for trade and commerce across the world. It also promoted human and animal interactions making contagious and infectious disease become epidemics and pandemic.

The more civilized humans became with smart and larger cities, more exotic trade routes, and increased contact with different people, animals, and ecosystems, the more likely epidemics become pandemics.

History of Pandemic: Timeline

Here are short details of some pandemics that have occurred over time:

Pandemic/ Epidemic/ Outbreak	Time period	Type / Pre-human host	Death Toll
Antonine Plague	165-180	Believed either smallpox or measles	5M
Japanese smallpox epidemic	735-737	Variola major virus	1M
Plague of Justinian	541-542	Yersinia pestis bacteria / Rats, fleas	30-50M
Black Death	1347-1351	Yersinia pestis bacteria / Rats, fleas	200M
New World Smallpox Outbreak	1520 – on- wards	Variola major virus	56M
Great Plague of London	1665	Yersinia pestis bacteria / Rats, fleas	100,000
Italian plague	1629-1631	Yersinia pestis bacteria / Rats, fleas	1M
Cholera Pandemics 1-6	1817-1923	V. cholerae bacteria	1M+
Third Plague	1885	Yersinia pestis bacteria / Rats, fleas	12M (China and India)
Yellow Fever	Late 1800s	Virus / Mosquitoes	100,000-150,000 (U.S.)
Russian Flu	1889-1890	Believed to be H2N2 (avian origin)	1M
Spanish Flu	1918-1919	H1N1 virus / Pigs	40-50M
Asian Flu	1957-1958	H2N2 virus	1.1M
Hong Kong Flu	1968-1970	H3N2 virus	1M
HIV/ AIDS	1981-present	Virus / Chimpanzees	25-35M
Swine Flu	2009-2010	H1N1 virus / Pigs	200,000
SARS	2002-2003	Coronavirus / Bats, Civets	770
Ebola	2014-2016	Ebolavirus / Wild animals	11,000
MERS	2015-Present	Coronavirus / Bats, camels	850
COVID-19	2019-Present	Coronavirus – Unknown (possibly pangolins)	2.7M (Johns Hopkins University estimate as of March 16, 2021

Above data Source: Article of VisualCapitalist

Pandemic

A pandemic is the worst case scenario in the realm of infectious diseases. When an epidemic spreads beyond a country’s borders, for instance multiple continents or worldwide, affecting a substantial number of people, then the disease officially becomes a pandemic. 

Since the earliest days of human history there have been a number of pandemics such as smallpox, tuberculosis, cholera, measles etc. The most fatal pandemic was the Black Death, which killed an estimated 75–200 million people during the 14th century.

Pandemic since earliest days of humankind

Communicable diseases existed during hunter-gatherer days of humankind. Shift to agrarian life 10,000 years ago created communities and it made epidemics more possible. Diseases like Malaria, tuberculosis, leprosy, influenza, smallpox etc. appeared during this period.

Lets see some pandemics occurred in recent decades;

Pandemics in the last 100 years

Spanish Flu : 1918

The Spanish flu which is avian-borne flu caused an estimated 50 million deaths worldwide. The Spanish flu was first observed in 1918 in Europe, the United States and parts of Asia before swiftly spreading around the world. At that time there were no effective drugs or vaccines to treat this killer disease. Wire service reports of a flu outbreak in Madrid in the spring of 1918. This led to the pandemic  called the “Spanish flu.”

SARS : 2003

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) is believed to have possibly started with bats in 2003, spread to cats and then to humans in China. This spread in 26 other countries and infected estimated 8,096 people, with 774 deaths.

SARS spread through respiratory droplets from coughs and sneezes. This was characterized by respiratory problems, dry cough, fever and head aches and body aches. Quarantine efforts proved effective to contain SARS and by July the virus was contained. 

COVID-19 (Novel Corona Virus): 2019

World Health Organization (WHO) officially announced COVID-19 virus a pandemic on March 11, 2020, after barreling through 114 countries in three months and infecting over 118,000 people. 

COVID-19 is caused by a novel coronavirus that has not been previously found in human. Symptoms of novel coronavirus include respiratory problems, fever, cough, and can lead to pneumonia. Like SARS, COVID-19 also spread through droplets from coughs and sneezes.

The first reported case of COVID-19 appeared on November 17, 2019, in the Hubei Province of China. The novel corona virus spread beyond Chinese borders to nearly every country in the world. By 9th May 2021, it had infected more than 158 million people with more than 3.6 million deaths worldwide. The number of new cases is growing faster than ever with more than 600,000 new reported each day.

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