Four Of the Worlds Deadliest Pandemics In Our History.

2020, Australian news, personal blog, World News and Facts 6 Minutes

With the world in so much uncertainty of late due to the Covid -19 outbreak, that has changed the lives every man, woman, child and even the family pet. Social Distancing and family Face-time calls are the new normal. Cafes and local hangouts closed for business and many of us have come to loathe the same four walls keeping us from our freedom. But this is not the first time planet earth has had a global outbreak of a Virus or a Plague and unfortunately it wont be the last. These last few months have got me thinking What did we do when this happened before? How did our ancestors handle global pandemics? How did they curb the spread? Well today I am going to give you Four of the worlds Deadliest pandemics in our history and how we overcame it.

As always if you think I have missed something out or you just want to talk comment below. If you like this blog topic please consider liking this post Thanks to much -Krissie

What is a Pandemic?

Firstly I probably should explain what actually Pandemic is and why its different to a normal outbreak.

An outbreak is where an infected person unknowingly spreads a disease to a greater than anticipated number of people causing cases to rise and local health departments to suffer under the pressure. If an outbreak is not controlled it can quickly escalate to what is called an Epidemic. Outbreaks of Influenza often occur in nursing homes and wings have to be completely locked down to protect the other residents in the home.

An Epidemic is a disease that affects a large number of people within a community, population or region. Think of big cities like New York in the USA, London in the UK and Sydney in Australia, where large amounts of people, live and gather, work and travel as places that could be Epicenters for an epidemic. It is not worldwide at this stage.

A Pandemic is when Multiple Countries or continents become infected with the same disease. Basically the disease somehow got a passport and is now on a round trip around the world.

The Plague of Justinian 541-542 A.D

4) The Plague of Justinian.

The plague of Justinian began in 541 AD and reoccurred until 750AD. During that time an estimated 50-100 Million people lost their lives to this at the time unknown illness.

Originating in China and Northeast India the Symptoms of this Plague were

  • Fever
  • Headaches
  • chills
  • Swollen or Tender lymph nodes
  • Abdominal Pain
  • Gangrene

The Plague was spread by sea traders and merchants and before long the plague had taken over the entire Mediterranean sea.

It took 225 years to be rid of the Justinian Plague, which was most likely caused by rodents carrying infected fleas that would then infect human host through bites. Studies have shown that even though the Justinian Plague and the Black Death are 800 years apart, they were both caused by the same microbe found in infected fleas.

If you caught the Justinian Plague even in those times you still were treated by a medical Physician or home remedy’s. Physicians actually flocked to Alexandra in Egypt for a four year course on how to fight disease centered on the teaching of Greek Physician Galen. ( 129-217CE )

3) The Cholera Pandemic.

The Cholera Pandemic was a series of not one but 7 deadly Pandemics that began in 1817, first originating in India. The world would be thrown into chaos with this disease for more than 200 hundred years with the 6th outbreak ending in 1923. Unfortunately it was not done and a new strain and 7th pandemic beginning in 1961 and still exists today in developing countries. This deadly disease would send with it the reaper every time an outbreak occurred with more than an estimated 5 million people killed every time an outbreak occurred.

Cholera requires immediate treatment, as Cholera can cause death within hours.

Symptoms of Cholera include:

  • Pain in abdomen
  • nausea
  • diarrhea
  • dehydration
  • lethargic
  • vomiting
  • water electrolyte imbalance

Medical Physicians would treat this disease with Antibiotics, Zinc supplements and re-hydration.

Cholera disease is caused by contaminated water as a bacteria called bacillus lives in untreated drinking water,lakes and rivers. People keep drinking the contaminated water even when ill because they thought water would make them better when in fact it was killing them. Cholera has not gone away either a small epidemic happened in 2014 and this disease still kills 120,000 people each year.

1918 Influenza – History of Vaccines.

2) The Spanish Flu.

The Spanish flu also known as the 1918 Flu pandemic, was an unusually deadly influenza strain that began in January 1918 to December 1920. The Virus infected 500 million globally and killed 50 – 80 Million people in that 18 month span.

The Flu actually began on the front lines of World War one. To maintain face and avoid panic, WW1 censors minimized early reports of the virus. Spain was a neutral country at the time, so newspapers were free to report on the devastation in Spain leaving the unsanitary conditions on the front unspoken about. Countries began placing blame on Spain, instead of preparing for an outbreak, much like our current situation.

Symptoms of the 1918 Flu included:

  • Fever
  • Dry Cough
  • Tiredness
  • Sweating
  • Stomach problems

Doctors at the time were at a loss about how to stop the spread of this virus so physicians urged people to stay home, avoid crowed places and cover your nose and mouth in public and don’t forget to wash your hands. Doctors became ill themselves, making their students step up to become make shift doctors. Schools and other buildings became make shift hospitals and businesses and the local pub closed indefinitely.

There was never a cure found for this virus, those that became infected either died from it or recovered and gained immunity via antibodies developing in the blood.

Even in 1918 there was social distancing!! There is something so eerie about the similarity’s between the 1918 virus and the current virus we are all trying to avoid.

The Black Death 1342

1) The Black Death.

last on this list is, The Black death and it is probably the most famous of all the pandemics in history. Its inspired nursery rhymes like ring-around-the-roise and is the Plague you often learn about the most in school.

The black death was a Bubonic plague that reaped upon the world from 1347-1351 and the again in 1750.

Symptoms included:

  • Bubones in the groin,neck and armpits which would ooze puss and bleed when opened. these would spread across the body if left untreated.
  • acute fever
  • vomiting blood
  • freckle like spots or rashes
  • pneumonia

Most of the people infected by this plague would die between 2-7 days after infection occurred.

Originating from china and India as before with the Justinian plague, the black death took over 200 million souls which makes it the highest death toll on this list by far. That is because the Black death was actually made up of not one but three Plagues,

  • The Bubonic ( most common )
  • Septicemic Plague ( bacteria in the blood which caused blacked skin,bleeding under the skin, shock and vomiting)
  • Pneumonic Plague ( flu based symptoms, coughing blood and respiratory problems)

Some cures at the time included blood letting, which basically is cutting the skin or a vein on purpose and letting the blood flow for a while essentially “bleeding out the toxin”. Did this work? probably not. Another approach was to burst the Buboes, Sweat the sickness out, rubbing onions on the Buboes, rubbing chopped snake on the Buboes…. drinking vinegar and eating crushed minerals. It is unclear if any of these methods actually worked.

Today in modern times we treat the plague with a strong dose of antibiotics and a trip to the good old hospital.

As I said at the start of this list with the Justinian Plague, the Black Death was caused by a microbe found on infected fleas that jump onto humans and bite them thus infecting them with the plague. Unlike diseases like Small Pox, the Black Death was never eradicated and still exists today, in fact the USA still treats about 7 cases of the Black Death every year.

So that is four of the worlds deadliest pandemics in our history and the end of my blog for another week thanks so much for reading. How are you holding up during this Pandemic? let me know your thoughts below.

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Published by TheOutpostPrincess

Just an Average girl who likes to Imagine.

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