Review article
https://doi.org/10.26800/LV-144-supl5-7
Great pandemics in the history of humanity
Luka Jerković
; Opća bolnica Karlovac
Abstract
Epidemics and pandemics have influenced human history and sometimes doomed entire civilizations. The most significant are the plague, cholera, smallpox and influenza. It is estimated that they killed 300 to 500 million people. The most severe plague pandemic was the Black Death in the 14th century. It killed a third of the European population, transformed European society and led to a labor shortage. More than 200 million people have died from the plague throughout human history. Cholera has caused seven pandemics so far. The deadliest of them was the third pandemic, at the end of the 19th century. Due to the improvement of public health and sanitary conditions, later pandemics were mostly diseases of poor countries. In the 18th century, smallpox was the main epidemic disease in the world. The historical turning point in the fight against smallpox was the development of the vaccine. This enabled the World Health Organization to eradicate smallpox in the world in 1975. Influenza pandemics occur every 10 to 50 years. The most famous is the Spanish flu from 1918. It was characterized by a large number of infected people and the death of 40 to 50 million people, most of them aged 20 to 40. Pandemics had a great impact on society and the world, but they also contributed to the development of modern medicine. Pandemics will become more frequent in the future. Therefore, lessons should be learned from pandemics in the past and efforts should be made to prevent such scale of impact on human health, life and the environment.
Keywords
PANDEMICS; PLAGUE; CHOLERA; SMALLPOX; FLU
Hrčak ID:
286285
URI
Publication date:
25.11.2022.
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