Dr. Mohammad Anowar Hossain :
It is a known fact that plagues and pandemics change the course of humanity forever. While thousands of people die, civilizations end, economy collapses, such diseases often become difficult to contain, posing a major challenge to the scientists as well as the governments across the world.
It is found in history that for the period from 541 to 2020, there had been a pandemic that killed a huge of approximately 40 per cent of the total population in Europe, Egypt and West Asia which is known as the Plague of Justinian killed 25-50 million people affected the Byzantine Empire. For the period 1347 to 1353, the Black Death, also known as The Great Bubonic plague, took a massive toll on the populations of Europe, Asia and North Africa, with an estimated fatality up to 200 million which was 60 per cent of the European population. Massively then the Great Plague of Marseille (1720-1723), cholera pandemic (1817-1824), Spanish Flu (1918-1920) and now Covid-19 (2019-2020) is ongoing and already killed approximately 3.03 million life.
The Great Plague of Marseille (1720-1723) started spreading in Marseille, France in 1720, killing a total of 1, 00,000 people. As per estimates, up to 30 per cent of the population of Marseille is expected to have perished due to the plague.
The first cholera pandemic (1817-1824) is also known as first Asiatic cholera pandemic or Asiatic cholera. It is known to have began in the city of Calcutta and spread throughout Southeast Asia to the Middle East, Eastern Africa and the Mediterranean coast over the time. Hundreds of people died during this pandemic. This pandemic affected almost every country in Asia.
Spanish Flu (1918-1920) is one of the deadliest influenza pandemic humanity has ever witnessed. While 500 million people became victim to Spanish flu, many indigenous communities were pushed to the brink of extinction. As per estimates, the death toll is put anywhere from 17 million to 50 million.
Mentionable that Despite the name Spanish Flu, the disease likely did not start in Spain. Spain was a neutral nation during the war and did not enforce strict censorship of its press, which could therefore freely publish early accounts of the illness. As a result, people falsely believed the illness was specific to Spain, and the name Spanish Flu stuck.
The researchers said that all of these pandemics mentioned above have exactly the same pattern as the corona virus outbreak in China. In the year 2020, the 100th anniversary of the Spanish Flu, humanity is facing a new potential pandemic popularly known as coronavirus or Covid-19. Although the Chinese authorities were reluctant to make official statements and appealed for calm, the situation deteriorated rapidly.
The corona virus pandemic is known as the Covid-19 pandemic and it is an ongoing pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome corona virus 2 (SARS CoV2). The outbreak was first traced out in Wuhan, China in December 2019. The World Health Organization declared the outbreak as Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30 January 2020, and a pandemic on 11 March 2020. As of 19 April 2021, more than 141.54 million people infected by Covid-19 have been reported in more than 221 countries and territories, resulting in more than 3.03 million deaths.
The virus can spread from person to person through small droplets from the nose or mouth, as the droplets land on objects and surfaces around the person. When sound healthy people touch the objects or surfaces and then touch their eyes, nose or mouth they can catch the virus.
(Dr. Mohammad Anowar Hossain is a freelancer)
