Pandemics

PANDEMICS

THE HISTORY & SCIENCE BEHIND THE

WORLD’S DEADLIEST OUTBREAKS

INSIDE

HOW THE COVID-19 VACCINE WORKS

 

CAN WE WIN THE WAR AGAINST VIRUSES?

 

BLACK DEATH 

THE MEDIEVAL OUTBREAK

THAT RAVAGED EUROPE

 

EXPOSED

FIND OUT HOW A

VIRUS REALLY WORKS

 

COVID-19

INVESTIGATING

ITS LEGACY

WARNING!

PATHOGENS

DETECTED 

Proceed with caution. You are entering a zone where a number of dangerous pathogens will be handled, ranging from the Black Death and the Spanish flu to the latest menace to humanity, COVID-19. Please ensure that the necessary safety measures have been taken before studying the evolution of viruses, learning how the plague that struck medieval Europe was cured and uncovering which diseases are now being targeted by the WHO. It is advised that you prepare yourself before examining precisely what viruses are and how the immune system and vaccines work to fight them off. Special precautions may be required before the final stage of your journey, in which you will explore whether viruses are currently flourishing in space and discover why some viruses are in fact necessary for the existence of life.

 

PANDEMICS

ANCIENT OUTBREAKS

THE EVOLUTION OF VIRUSES 10

 

HISTORIC PANDEMICS 16

 

THE BLACK DEATH

HISTORY OF THE BLACK DEATH 24

 

LAZZARETTO ISLANDS 30

 

SCOURGE 32

 

PLAGUE DOCTORS 34

 

HOW TO CURE THE BLACK DEATH 46

 

INSIDE AN APOTHACARY 48

 

ANATOMY OF A PHYSICIAN 50

 

INFLUENZA

SPANISH FLU 54

DAY IN THE LIFE OF A FLU MEDIC 62

 

THE FLU OF ’57 AND ’68 64

HOW FLU WORKS 68

 

THE SCIENCE

YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM 72

 

WHAT IS A VIRUS? 82

 

VIRUS VS BACTERIA 88

 

EBOLA 90

 

RISE OF THE SUPERBUGS 92

 

SMALLPOX VACCINE 96

 

10 PIONEERING SCIENTISTS & MEDICS 98

 

COVID-19 AND THE FUTURE OF VIRUSES COVID-19 104

 

INSIDE A COVID-19 TEST LAB 112

 

HOW THE VACCINE WORKS 114

 

THE WHO’S WAR ON VIRUSES 118

 

SPACE VIRUSES 124

 

WHY WE NEED VIRUSES 126

 

ANCIENT OUTBREAKS

THE EVOLUTION OF VIRUSES 10

Find out when and how the very first viruses emerged on planet Earth

 

HISTORIC PANDEMICS 16

These devastating outbreaks claimed millions of lives across the world

 

THE EVOLUTION OF VIRUSES

EXPLORING THE MYSTERIOUS ORIGINS OF OUR PLANET’S SMALLEST PARASITES

WRITTEN BY JAMES HORTON

 

P12
Viruses are curious biological entities. They are obligate parasites; unable to replicate on their own, they instead exist by hijacking the cellular apparatus of other cells to replicate and proliferate. As such, they are simplistic – so simple, in fact, that they don’t satisfy all the criteria to be considered ‘alive’.

P16

HISTORIC PANDEMICS
OVER MILLENNIA, EPIDEMICS AND PANDEMICS HAVE KILLED MILLIONS ALL OVER THE WORLD, EVEN CONTRIBUTING TO THE DOWNFALL OF POWERFUL CIVILISATIONS
WRITTEN BY BALJEET PANESAR

Diseases have ravaged humanity since ancient times; 5,000 years ago, an epidemic wiped out a village in China, and 3,000-year-old Egyptian mummies show the signs of smallpox. As humans have spread across the world, infectious diseases have spread too; nothing has killed more humans than disease-causing bacteria and viruses.

In prehistoric times, outbreaks of disease would be confined to one community. However, once trade and commerce allowed humans to interact with different animals, ecosystems and populations, it became much easier for diseases to spread and conquer the world. The Plague of Justinian, for example, spread across the Byzantine Empire’s trade route through Asia, North Africa, Arabia and Europe and perhaps helped to initiate the downfall of this ancient civilisation, thereby changing the course of world history.

Between pandemics, humans have battled against measles, smallpox, influenza and polio, diseases that have killed millions of people over hundreds of years. Only smallpox has been eradicated – the others are still with us today.

Typically, over the last few hundred years pandemics have struck humans every ten to 50 years. Over more recent years, however, they have become more frequent and more deadly and are spreading more quickly.

1

LOCATION

Athens, Greece

DATE

430 BCE

DEATH TOLL

75,000-100,000

OUTBREAK
PLAGUE OF ATHENS

More than 2,400 years ago, as the cities of Athens and Sparta were battling in the Peloponnesian War, a deadly illness ripped through Athens, striking fear and panic into her citizens. The disease reached Athens via the port city of Piraeus, killing almost a third of its population, spreading throughout Greece and the eastern Mediterranean.

To protect the people of Athens, its leader, Pericles, ordered the Athenians to move within the city’s newly built ‘long walls’, but this gave the disease the perfect conditions in which to thrive and quickly infect more of the Athenian population.

In History Of The Peloponnesian War, the ancient Greek historian Thucydides, who fell victim to the disease and survived, 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 emitted an unnatural and fetid breath”. Despite written evidence of the disease its cause isn’t known, though typhoid fever and Ebola are possibilities.

Months later, the disease finally subsided and for a brief period the Athenians were granted clemency, but it would strike twice more, forcing Athens to surrender to Sparta in 404 BCE and ending Athens’ domination in ancient Greece.

 

2

LOCATION

Roman Empire

D A T E

165–180 CE

DEATH TOLL

5,000,000

OUTBREAK

ANTONINE PLAGUE

 

A gruesome and disfiguring disease named after the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus was brought to Rome at the height of the Roman Empire. As soldiers returned from battle in the Near East, they brought home more than just pride and victory. Once they reached Rome, there was no stopping the disease and it spread throughout Europe, having already raced across Asia Minor, Greece and Italy.

The disease caused fevers, chills, black diarrhoea and red and black papules on skin, which caused severe scarring after they had scabbed – a sign that their bearer had survived the disease. For two to three weeks victims would suffer until they could fight no longer. Victims would first experience symptoms two weeks after being infected, a feature that allowed it to spread rapidly all over the empire. The disease was probably smallpox, and it was documented by the Greek doctor Galen.

Up to 2,000 people were killed per day, a fate that awaited some ten per cent of the empire’s soldiers, but in some places up to a third of the Roman population would perish, decimating the empire’s army. In response, all offensive campaigns were postponed – there were not enough men to fight. Eventually, freed slaves, gladiators and criminals – who normally would not qualify for military service – were recruited after Germanic tribes began to claim more of the Roman Empire’s territory.

Over the next two decades the empire would experience two more outbreaks, ultimately contributing to the downfall of one of the world’s largest ever empires.

3

LOCATION

Byzantine Empire

DATE

541–542 CE

DEATH TOLL

25,000,000+

OUTBREAK

PLAGUE OF JUSTINIAN

By 540 CE, the Byzantine Empire had conquered most of Italy and North Africa. Spain was next on the list. But the following year, a new disease would emerge in the port city of Pelusium, Egypt, and devastate the Byzantine capital of Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul, Turkey). This disease – the bubonic plague – would kill millions of people as it spread through the vast empire and marked the start of the decline of one of the greatest empires in history.

 

Named after the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I, the Plague of Justinian is the first known of the three deadly plague pandemics, caused by the bacteria Yersinia pestis. As a tribute to the emperor’s powerful realm, ships carrying grain and cloth were sent to Constantinople from North Africa. However, these ships also carried flea-infested rats that would infect people with plague throughout Asia, Arabia, North Africa and Europe.

Victims of the disease would develop a fever and black, pus-filled blisters called buboes. Some victims would become delusional and paranoid. In a matter of days the victim would perish; in Constantinople, the contagion would kill 5,000 people each day, and in time around 40 per cent of the city’s population. Even the emperor was infected, but he survived. Further outbreaks ravaged the Mediterranean Basin and Europe for more than 200 years, resulting in the deaths of half of Europe’s population despite the disease becoming less deadly with each outbreak. The disease would finally disappear in 750 CE.

4

LOCATION

Mexico

DATE

1545–1548

DEATH TOLL

15,000,000

Outbreak
COCOLIZTLI EPIDEMIC

Following the arrival of Europeans in present-day Mexico, one of the deadliest epidemics in human history struck the Aztecs. The Aztecs were vulnerable; the Europeans had brought disease from their faraway lands that the Aztecs had never encountered and had no immunity against. Of the three epidemics that ravaged Mexico during the 16th century, it was the second outbreak that would be the most devastating, wiping out up to 80 per cent of the indigenous population.

The natives named the mysterious disease ‘cocoliztli’, which means ‘pestilence’ in the local Nahuatl language. The disease caused fevers, hallucinations and bleeding from the eyes, mouth and nose. Victims would succumb to the disease between three and four days after infection. Hundreds of people perished each day.

For 500 years the cause of the epidemic had been unknown, but a recent study found that a rare strain of salmonella called Salmonella paratyphi C may have been responsible. The bacteria are known to cause enteric fevers in humans, for example typhoid, but this strain of salmonella seldom causes disease in humans today.

5

LOCATION

Marseille, France

DATE

1720–1723

DEATH TOLL

100,000

GREAT PLAGUE OF MARSEILLE

After travelling in the eastern Mediterranean for about a year, a ship called the Grand Saint-Antoine arrived at its final destination, the port city of Marseille. Its cargo of silk and cotton was destined for a trade show, but hidden among the luxurious goods was the bacteria Yersinia pestis, which would soon be responsible for the Great Plague of Marseille. During the voyage, several men had died on board, including a passenger who perished two months before the ship’s arrival in Marseille. Despite the signs of bubonic plague on the ship, it was only quarantined for a few days, resulting in Western Europe’s last major outbreak of bubonic plague.

Within days of arriving in Marseille, the disease claimed its first victims. Corruption, negligence and misinformation all contributed to the spread of the disease; officials even paid doctors to diagnose the disease as pestilential fever, not plague. Only two months later, once the disease could no longer be contained, were measures

taken to reduce the spread of the epidemic. These included stopping trade, quarantining people, burying corpses and disinfecting the

city. As for the fate of the Grand Saint-Antoine? The ship was burned off the coast of Marseille.