A Comparison Between the Black Plague and Covid-19

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The Black Plague and Covid-19: A comparison
The outbreak of Covid-19 was described as a global health emergency by the World Health Organization (WHO) in January 2020. The virus is characterized by its high virulence, rapid transmission, and environmental contamination. The high-level quarantines and other significant responses to the pandemic are similar to the extreme measures implemented during the plague, popularly known by the moniker Black Death. The pestilence of the 14th Century is one of the most destructive pandemics in human history. The plague raged on for years claiming the lives of at least 20 million people and wiping out 30 percent of Europe’s population (Pitlik 2). The Black Death is regarded as the largest pandemic in the world due to its geographical and chronological range and resultant deaths. Covid-19 has gained global attention since its outbreak. The virus has rapidly spread across the globe, infecting millions of people and causing thousands of fatalities. This paper explores the Black Death and the Covid-19 and compares the two pandemics regarding their virulence, transmissibility, and number of casualties.
A Comparison
The famous phrase “history repeats itself” seems to be the ideal descriptive link between Covid-19 and the plague of the 14th Century. Just like the Black Death, Covid-19 is an inconspicuous, mischievous, and indiscernible disease (Shamekh, Ata, and Sarvin 6). The plague started in the East, rapidly spread through towns and cities, and infected vast populations in different countries. The rapid transmission of the plague was facilitated by international trade and travel. This is a similar aspect of the transmissibility of Covid-19, whose swift spread was aided by the modern-day frequency of global travel through air, sea, and road. Some of the preventive measures being used to curb the spread of Covid-19 can be traced back to the Black Death era when there was no medicine to fight the disease. For instance, imposing quarantines and avoiding contaminated objects and infected patients were applied mainly to control the spread of the plague. Travel between cities, provinces and other regions was banned, similar to the travel bans and lockdown measures applied by various countries as a containment measure against Covid-19.
Though caused by different pathogens – the plague was caused by a bacterium while Covid-19 is a virus – the two diseases meet international parameters and definitions of pandemics. The spread and destructiveness of both diseases have been influenced by several societal factors such as active engagements between various human societies across the globe, environmental and climatic changes, and...