Pandemics and Coronavirus!

Coronavirus (and 

https://www.history.com/news/6-devastating-plagues 

Coronavirus has become a news item.  

One of the news articles states:

“The contagion that’s locked down travel for tens of millions of Chinese has claimed 41 lives, with 15 new deaths announced today, among them a doctor in Wuhan who’d been treating Coronavirus patients. Outside of China, cases have been reported in seven Asian nations, Australia, America and France. Hong Kong declared a health emergency and canceled Lunar New Year celebrations, while Taiwan has banned tour groups from China’s Hubei province, where the virus originated in Wuhan.”

“What’s the international response? While the World Health Organization hasn’t declared an emergency, nations like Britain, investigating suspected cases and tracing 2,000 recent arrivals from Hubei, are on alert.”

Yes, viruses come and go.  But, the threat of a pandemic does exist.

Over history, there have been major health pandemics:

-1 The Plague of Justinian

“The pandemic is believed to have originated in Africa and then spread to Europe through infected rats on merchant ships. It reached the Byzantine capital of Constantinople in 541 A.D., and was soon claiming up to 10,000 lives per day—so many that unburied bodies were eventually stacked inside buildings or left in the open. “ and “It is believed to have killed at least 25 million people, but the actual death toll may have been much higher.

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10,000 deaths a day - with unburied bodies filling the streets. And, even with the population of that day, 25 million was a huge death toll!!

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-2 The Black Death

“The populations of whole towns were wiped out, and it was said that the living spent most of their time burying the dead in mass graves.” and “The Black Death finally subsided in the West around 1353, but not before it killed as many as 50 million people—more than half the population of Europe.”

-3 The Italian Plague of 1629-31

“These harsh measures may have helped contain the scourge, but it still killed some 280,000 people, including over half the residents of Verona. The Republic of Venice, meanwhile, lost nearly a third of its population of 140,000. Some scholars have since argued that the outbreak may have sapped the city-state’s strength and led to its decline as a major player on the world stage.”

-4 The Great Plague of London

“Somewhere between 75,000 and 100,000 people eventually perished before the outbreak died down in 1666. Later that same year, London was visited by a second major tragedy when the Great Fire of 1666 torched much of its city center.”

-5 The Third Plague Pandemic

“The worldwide outbreak would eventually claim some 15 million lives before petering out in the 1950s.

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Today, travel between countries flourishes.  Viruses can spread easily as travelers, business people and even international students can bring germs from around the world to our neighborhoods.  

Will the Coronavirus be a pandemic?  Who knows.  

One of my summers at Citibank, plans were made for “Continuity of Business” in case of a pandemic illness.  What if half of your workforce were infected and died? What if half of your customers were infected and died?  

While modern health analysis can spot potential issues, diseases can spread quicker than medical help!!  Are you ready?

Hugs!!

Karen