Major epidemics and pandemics - Summary on a Map

Aug 9, 2023

Major epidemics and pandemics - Summary on a Map

We briefly retrace major global epidemics and pandemics that have impacted human history since the end of man’s hunter-gatherer lifestyle until the present day.
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Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/geohistory
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English translation \u0026 voiceover: Rahul Venkit https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCD1X…
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Original French version:    • Les grandes épidémies et pandémies - …
Russian version:    • Крупнейшие пандемии и эпидемии - на к…
Arabic version:    • الأوبئة على مر التاريخ
Spanish version:    • Las grandes epidemias y pandemias - H…
Portuguese version (Brazil): Coming soon
Japanese version:    • 感染症の歴史
German version:    • Verheerende Pandemien in der Geschich…
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Music: Side Show - Causmic (YouTube library)
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Software used for editing: Adobe After Effects
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Sources:
- Universalis
- www.who.int
- Global population: https://www.herodote.net/La_populatio… - Number of dead: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/0…
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Chapters
00:00 Origins
00:54 Ancient Greece and the Roman Empire
02:13 Plague of Justinian
03:31 Leprosy
04:31 The Black Death
05:56 The Columbian Exchange
07:29 Cholera and Plague
08:51 Influenza
09:58 HIV
11:01 Current situation

#geohistory #history #pandemic #covid19

Content

0.54 -> Around the year 9000 BC, man gradually evolves from a hunter-gatherer lifestyle

6.3 -> to a relatively more sedentary one.

8.74 -> In Mesopotamia, initially, man begins to develop agriculture and livestock.

14.22 -> This new proximity between animals and man facilitates the transmission of diseases to the latter.

20.76 -> Food production increases; communities, villages and cities grow; trade routes appear;

26.1 -> and the first wars take place.

28.63 -> All this contributes to the spread of new contagious diseases.

32.9 -> Although there aren’t enough historical traces or documentation,

36.66 -> the first epidemics probably take place at this time and perhaps even the first pandemics,

42.12 -> i.e. the spread of an epidemic among different people over large geographical areas.

48.72 -> Some religious texts and Egyptian papyri recount the first outbreaks.

57.32 -> The development of writing allows a Greek historian to document a pandemic around 430 BC.

64.24 -> Known as the Plague of Athens, it is a disease that remains unidentified to this day.

70.02 -> According to the story, and thus the Greek point of view, the illness emerges in Ethiopia,

75.62 -> spreads in Egypt, Libya, and then throughout the Mediterranean basin.

79.92 -> Athens is at war with Sparta and its allies.

83.46 -> The city hosts many refugees and is under siege.

86.8 -> Too densely populated and in poor hygienic conditions, the Plague of Athens worsens

92.38 -> and kills 25-30% of the population, which facilitates Spartan victory.

98.58 -> Around the year 165, when the Mediterranean basin is dominated by the Roman Empire,

104.06 -> the Antonine Plague appears, which is probably a smallpox pandemic.

109.159 -> It starts in Mesopotamia and spreads rapidly westward following military travel patterns.

115.35 -> The disease kills 5 million people out of the then global population of 200 to 250 million people.

122.56 -> The Roman Empire is hit hard.

125.1 -> Other epidemics further weaken it over the following centuries,

128.72 -> probably influencing the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

137.1 -> In 541 begins the first known pandemic of bubonic plague,

141.74 -> linked to a bacteria infecting small mammals, mainly rats, and their fleas.

147.489 -> In some cases, the rat fleas bite humans and transmit bacteria to them.

152.93 -> Once the infection reaches the lungs, it becomes highly contagious between humans.

157.94 -> According to recent studies, the Plague of Justinian started in Central Asia

163.22 -> and spread via land and sea trade routes to the Byzantine Empire.

167.68 -> The capital Constantinople is badly affected.

170.9 -> As it lies on a commercial crossroad, the disease spreads throughout the Mediterranean basin.

176.669 -> Byzantine military troops engaged in the West are contaminated, which halts the expansion of the empire.

183.799 -> In Rome, Pope Pelagius II succumbs to the disease.

188.15 -> In Mesopotamia, the Byzantine and Sasanian empires,

191.68 -> already severely affected by the pandemic, lose steam in war.

195.94 -> This benefits the Arabs who start their Muslim conquests.

199.7 -> The Sasanian Empire collapses while the Byzantine Empire is greatly reduced.

205.26 -> The Plague of Justinian claims between 30 and 100 million victims over two centuries.

215.1 -> Leprosy is a bacterial disease mentioned in texts dating back to Antiquity.

220.38 -> Probably native to East Africa according to recent studies,

223.92 -> it spreads through Egypt to Asia and Europe following trade routes.

229.04 -> As Europe’s population gets denser, it is likely that crusades to Jerusalem

233.64 -> accelerated the spread of leprosy on the continent.

236.9 -> Bad hygiene, lack of sewers and poorly ventilated homes fosters transmission of this disease,

243.029 -> which is otherwise not very contagious.

245.919 -> The poor are the worst affected.

247.93 -> Exclusion measures are taken against the sick.

250.68 -> Lepers are considered already dead by the Catholic religion.

254.54 -> They are isolated in leper colonies, which can be anything

257.78 -> from a simple hut on the edge of a village or leprosaria - sickroom facilities - in cities.

264.68 -> Lepers end their lives in such confinements, completely isolated from the outside world.

274.2 -> The Black Death is considered the second pandemic of bubonic plague.

278.51 -> It originates in the steppes of Central Asia, and spreads across the continent.

283.32 -> On the shores of the Black Sea, warriors of the Golden Horde besiege the Genoese city of Caffa.

289.64 -> Weakened by the plague, they catapult their dead into the city to spread the disease.

294.52 -> Rats also likely further contaminate the city.

298.2 -> After the siege fails, Genoese sailors resume trade across Europe, spreading the plague in port cities.

305.1 -> The disease then spreads inland.

307.56 -> Only regions of Poland, Bohemia and Hungary are spared.

312.04 -> The plague manifests strongly in densely populated areas and disproportionately affects the poor,

318.34 -> the malnourished and those living in unsanitary conditions.

322.38 -> Doctors are overwhelmed.

324.24 -> In a few years, the disease kills 200 million people worldwide,

328.56 -> a little less than half the European population.

331.64 -> The continent would take two centuries to recover its pre-pandemic demography.

336.68 -> The Black Death is endemic, that is, it would locally resurface several times over the following centuries.

343.46 -> Preventive measures are taken, especially in Venice where ships have to wait 40 days

348.42 -> before being able to enter the port.

350.76 -> These are the first quarantines -- quaranta being the Italian word for the number 40.

360.08 -> In Europe, the construction of new, more efficient vessels

363.54 -> allows the Spanish and Portuguese to broaden exploration.

367.32 -> With Christopher Columbus landing in America, and Vasco da Gama opening a sea route to India

372.46 -> through the African coasts, exchanges rapidly increase between people

377.12 -> previously isolated from each other and with different immunity systems.

381.72 -> People from the Old World import along with them a dozen diseases still unknown in the New World.

388.16 -> Smallpox proves particularly devastating for Native Americans.

392.36 -> Epidemics decimate entire populations even before the arrival of European settlers.

398.42 -> Conversely, a form of virulent syphilis, a sexually transmitted infection,

403.54 -> is imported from America to Europe.

406.16 -> Furthermore, tropical diseases such as yellow fever and malaria,

409.939 -> caused by parasites, spread around the world via carrier mosquitoes that accompany ships.

415.79 -> Meanwhile, medicine continues to evolve in the face of multiple disease outbreaks.

421.37 -> In 1768, an English apothecary named John Fewster finds that people infected with cowpox,

427.98 -> a disease dangerous to bovines but not humans, are protected from the smallpox virus.

434.03 -> A few years later, the cowpox vaccine is injected into populations to counter smallpox:

440.06 -> resulting in the first form of vaccine.

442.92 -> The treatment would evolve and the smallpox disease would be eradicated over two centuries.

452.52 -> Cholera is a bacterial infection that only affects the human species

457.18 -> through the ingestion of contaminated food or water.

460.28 -> The disease causes severe diarrhea resulting in life-threatening dehydration.

465.68 -> Without treatment, half of those infected die within a few hours or days.

470.86 -> The disease spreads more rapidly in densely populated areas with poor hygienic conditions.

476.76 -> The first cholera pandemic begins in 1817 in the vicinity of Bengal and spreads in Asia,

483.28 -> Africa and to the gates of Europe.

485.88 -> Five other cholera pandemics would break out over the following century and affect the entire world.

492.04 -> In 1855, in the west of Yunnan, China, begins the third and last pandemic of bubonic plague.

498.76 -> It spreads slowly to the port city of Hong Kong from where, in a few years,

503.08 -> it spreads from ships in ports around the whole world.

507.12 -> But this time, French biologists and doctors discover the bacteria responsible

511.58 -> for the disease and how rat fleas propagate it.

515.4 -> A serum is created and rat extermination measures are taken on vessels which limits numbers,

521.54 -> mainly in developed countries.

523.8 -> British India is still badly affected with around 10 million deaths, while China has 2 million victims.

534.56 -> Influenza is an infectious disease that is difficult to contain

538.4 -> because it is caused by four different strains of viruses that can quickly mutate and generate new epidemics.

545.96 -> The first major flu pandemic, called the Russian flu, raged in 1889 and 1890

552.28 -> from the Eurasian steppes to the European and American continents.

556.54 -> But it’s the second major influenza outbreak, known as the Spanish flu,

560.54 -> which proves to be the most devastating flu pandemic.

564.28 -> Its origins still unknown, it appears during World War I.

568.399 -> In the United States, the virus mutates and becomes virulent.

572.899 -> Transported by soldiers to Europe, the disease spreads through the globe as soon as World War I ends.

579.189 -> A third of the world's population is infected, and about 50 million people die from it.

585.129 -> There would be 2 further flu pandemics causing approximately 1 million deaths each:

590.84 -> the so-called Asian Flu in 1957 and the Hong Kong pandemic in 1968.

601.06 -> Originally from central Africa,

603.18 -> the AIDS virus spreads from chimpanzees to man due to hunting some 60 years earlier.

608.9 -> The virus slowly reaches Leopoldville in the Belgian Congo

612.74 -> from where it spreads across river routes and railways all around the country,

617.62 -> and then across the continent.

619.86 -> In 1964, the return of contaminated Haitian workers takes the disease to North America,

626.04 -> especially in the United States from 1970.

630.1 -> In 1983, in Paris, the Pasteur Institute identifies the HIV virus that causes AIDS,

636.74 -> the disease that weakens the immune system and therefore facilitates the development of other infections.

643.54 -> AIDS then infects people worldwide to qualify as a pandemic in 2005.

649.2 -> Prevention, treatment and contraceptives help curb the disease,

653.26 -> but still results in about 30 million victims in 30 years.

657.74 -> Today, some 40 million people live with HIV.

665 -> At the end of 2019, the SARS-CoV-2 virus is probably transmitted from animals to humans

671.86 -> and is first observed in Wuhan, China.

674.84 -> With high levels of globalization, the new disease COVID-19 spreads rapidly around the world.

681.12 -> On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declares it a pandemic.

686.48 -> Furthermore, despite major advances in medicine, other diseases still claim many victims.

692.34 -> Plague is still rampant and reappears regularly,

695.7 -> the last epidemic in 2017 hitting Madagascar and Seychelles.

700.02 -> A seventh cholera pandemic has been underway since 1961

704.38 -> and still causes 100,000 global victims each year, according to WHO.

710.36 -> There are under 3 million leprosy patients worldwide,

713.74 -> while seasonal flu kills about 500,000 people annually.

718.22 -> Malaria claims as many victims each year, the vast majority being young children in Sub-Saharan Africa.

725.3 -> Poor and remote populations remain the main victims of these epidemics and pandemics.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7ivFcGbFJM