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Pandemics Over The Years A Trip Down Memory Lane

May 24, 2021 at 12:11 am by Editorial
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Anupama Nair                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              www.mediaeyenews.com                           

It is more than a year now, we’ve been hearing the word Pandemic and a mere ‘virus’, that originated from China is holding the world hostage. The killer Virus Corona, affected millions and killed many more. So, I thought let me do a research on the Pandemics over the years and how they impacted the world. Before Corona, there are many Pandemics that almost wiped the entire human population. Fasten your seat belts, I am taking you on a time travel, many millenniums ago.

What is a Pandemic? In the kingdom of infectious diseases, a pandemic is the worst case scenario. When an epidemic spreads beyond a nation’s borders, that’s when the disease officially becomes a pandemic. Intermittent outbreaks of infectious diseases have had profound and lasting effects on societies throughout history. Those events have powerfully shaped the economic, political, and social aspects of human civilization, with their effects often lasting for centuries. Epidemic outbreaks have defined some of the basic tenets of modern medicine, pushing the scientific community to develop principles of epidemiology, prevention, immunization, and antimicrobial treatments.

In a long succession throughout history, pandemic outbreaks have decimated societies, determined outcomes of wars, wiped out entire populations, but also, paradoxically, cleared the way for innovations and advances in science (including medicine and public health), economy, and political systems. Pandemic outbreaks, or plagues in the ancient history, as they are often referred to, have been closely examined in the realm of history, including the history of medicine. In the era of modern world, plague is however not such a killer pandemic as other diseases.

As civilizations spread, so did pandemics, some of which decimated millions of lives. Communicable diseases existed even during the time of “early men” and when man were hunters, but the shift to agrarian life nearly ten thousand years ago created communities that made epidemics more possible. Malaria, tuberculosis, leprosy, influenza, and smallpox were major diseases during this period.

The first recorded epidemic was in China the birth place of Corona too. Around 5000 years ago, an epidemic wiped out a pre-historic village in China. It is said that the bodies of the dead were stuffed inside a house that was later burned down. No age group was spared, as the skeletons of juveniles, young adults and middle-aged were found inside the house. The site is now called "Hamin Mangha" and is one of the best-preserved pre-historic sites in northeastern China. Before the discovery of “Hamin Mangha”, another pre-historic mass burial site was discovered, believed to be of the same period called “Miaozigou”, in northeastern China. These discoveries prove that an epidemic ravaged the entire region. 

Greece was the next venue. In 430 B.C., just before the war between Athens and Sparta began, an epidemic ravaged the people of Athens and lasted for five years. Reports stated around  one hundred thousand people lost their lives. The Greek historian Thucydides wrote that "people in good health were all of a sudden attacked by violent heats in the head, and redness and inflammation in the eyes, the inward parts, such as the throat or tongue, becoming bloody and emitting an unnatural and fetid breath". There are varied causes for the epidemic, some scientists say typhoid, while others say it was Ebola. Many scholars believed that overcrowding due to the war worsened the epidemic. Spartan army was stronger, thereby forcing the Athenians to take refuge behind a series of fortifications called the "long walls" that protected their city. Despite the epidemic, the war continued till  Athens was conceded defeat to Sparta.

Let us now travel to Rome. It was another outbreak that occurred a couple of centuries later that was documented and recorded by contemporary physicians of the time. It was the first recorded Pandemic, which affected many countries. The outbreak was known as the Antonine Plague of 165–180 AD. The Antonine plague occurred in the Roman Empire during the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161–180 A.D.) and the cause is thought to be smallpox.

The disease was brought into the Roman Empire by soldiers returning from Seleucia (now in Turkey), and before it declined, it had impacted Asia Minor, Egypt, Greece, and Italy. Unlike the plague of Athens, which affected a limited area, the Antonine plague spread across the vast territory of the great Roman Empire. Nearly one-third of the population was wiped out, and also annihilated the Roman army. The Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius himself lost his life.

Now let us visit Ethiopia. The Cyprian Plague (250-262 AD) described as “the end of the world”, started in Ethiopia and passed through North Africa, then onto Egypt and Rome. The city dwellers fled to the villages, further spreading the infection. The impact of the disease was felt in the next three centuries and saw recurring outbreaks, including in Britain in 444 AD. At the peak of the disease nearly five thousand deaths were reported in Rome alone.

Egypt is the next place to visit. First appearing in Egypt, the plague called Justinian plague spread through Palestine and the Byzantine Empire, and then throughout the Mediterranean region. The plague changed the course of the Roman Empire. The emperor Justinian's dream to bring the Roman Empire back together was crushed and as it caused massive economic problems. Recurrences over the next two centuries eventually killed about fifty million people, which was roughly twenty six percent of the world population. It is believed to be the first significant appearance of the bubonic plague, which is spread by rats and fleas.

Leprosy, though a killer disease for many centuries, it grew into a pandemic in Europe in the Middle Ages, resulting in the building of numerous leprosy-related hospitals to treat the large number of patients. Leprosy was caused due to a slow-developing bacterial disease that causes sores and deformities. Leprosy was believed to be a punishment from God  and this belief led to moral judgments and ostracization of victims.

“The Black Death” (1343 to 1356 AD ) or simply “The Plague” was a pandemic of unparalleled levels, caused by the bubonic plague that originated in China in 1334, which spread through central Asia, then entered northern India, and finally arrived in Europe (Sicily) in 1347, through the famous Silk Trade route. Within 5 years, the plague conquered almost the entire European continent, further spreading into Russia and the Middle East. The peak of the plague was from 1343 to 1356 AD, and it continued in a milder form till 1400 AD. The killer plague was responsible for reducing the world population from 450 million to below 300 million. According to historians, Black Death killed sixty percent of the European population alone. England and France in midst of the Hundred Year War (1337 to 1453) was much devastated by the Black Death.

Let us now travel to the New World. The Cocoliztli (Aztec word for ‘pest’) epidemic (1545-1548) was a form of viral hemorrhagic fever that killed fifteen million inhabitants of Mexico and Central America. It caused widespread devastation among a population who were already suffering from extreme drought. The disease proved to be utterly catastrophic.

Our next destination is London. The London Plague (1665-1666) started in April  and spread rapidly through the hot summer months. Fleas from plague-infected rodents were one of the main causes of transmission. By the time the plague ended, hundred thousand people died, that included fifteen percent of the population of London. However, this was not the end of the city's suffering. On September 2, 1666, the Great Fire of London started, lasting for four days and burning down a large portion of the city. 

I will take you to more places in the next part of the story. If you have noticed majority of the Pandemics spread from China. It is not possible to answer the question why? May be we will get an answer someday soon.

 

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