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A pandemic is the term used to describe a great epidemic that spreads across large areas (on different continents) at the same time. It is easy to spread (most often by droplets). It is easier to get sick when the human body has no immunity to a given disease, which is most often the result of a mutation of the virus causing the disease.
Usually speaking “pandemic”, we mean the flu (Spanish flu, avian flu, swine flu). Most callers epidemic i pandemic the viruses are: H1N1, H3N2, H2N2. However, the term “pandemic” not only applies to influenza, but can also apply to any other disease that is easily spread and spread over large areas. In the case of influenza, prophylaxis is vaccines that help to prevent, above all, dangerous complications. However, viruses have mutation abilities (especially influenza A virus) that are not affected by antibodies in the human body.
Are you wondering how you can strengthen your immunity? Use the online visit option and consult a specialist of your choice without leaving your home.
Pandemic and epidemic, the greatest pandemics in history
An epidemic is a term for an increased number of cases in a given area at a given time, and a pandemic covers much larger areas, the entire country, continent or the world. The greatest pandemics in history include:
- Justinian’s plague – in the middle of the 40th century, in the Byzantine Empire. The bubonic plague pandemic caused 60 percent of people to die. inhabitants of Constantinople, and according to researchers, it even reached North Africa and the central part of Asia and Europe, where it could be the cause of death as much as XNUMX percent. the sick;
- Black Death – disease caused by plague rods (Yersinia pestis). It probably broke out in China or Central Asia, passed through the Silk Road to Crimea in 1346, from where it spread to the Mediterranean and Europe. Possibly transmitted by fleas on rats. The disease killed around 200 million people. Plague outbreaks occurred fairly regularly up to the XNUMXth century;
- smallpox (smallpox) – The sixteenth century decimated South and North America, gathered the greatest harvest among the Incas and Aztecs and the indigenous people of North America. Six epidemics of the disease occurred in Boston between 1636 and 1698. Black pox pandemics in 60th century Europe took the lives of around XNUMX million people;
- plague in the nineteenth centurywhich erupted in China (Yunnan) and gradually spread to other continents. In China and India alone, there were approximately 12 million deaths. Considered one of the greatest pandemics in the world;
- cholera in XIX century – about 40 million in India alone, about 100 thousand in Europe and America;
- Spanish flu 1918-1919 – the greatest flu pandemic in the history of mankind, affected almost all continents, caused the death of about 100 million people.
In early March 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus pandemic, which has so far claimed far fewer deaths than the largest pandemics in history (the number of deaths worldwide is now just over 100).
People suffer from epidemics with smaller incidence and number of cases all the time – it is enough to recall the bird or swine flu, Ebola virus or typhus, epidemics of which broke out in the XNUMXth century, mainly during wars.
Except pandemics and epidemics there is also the term “endemia” – covering cases of a specific disease in a small area, repeating from time to time at a similar number of cases.
If you want to boost your immunity, you can try colostrum dietary supplements, which is a substance present in cattle milk up to a few days after giving birth.
- Check if you may have contracted the coronavirus. Do the test:
The editorial board recommends:
- Hilary Koprowski – Polish hero of the fight against polio
- How is the epidemic going? Maths forecast for 2021
- History repeats itself? “We can treat the Spanish epidemic as a warning”
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