Epidemics of corona 19 virus has swept and affect the entire world like never before. World economics is in tatters. Rulers are shaken. Global communications are super-fast. Airbus and Boeing have made flying so easy and so cheap. Citizens are at a loss.
Frank M. Snowden, a professor emeritus of history and the history of medicine at Yale, has published a book in October 2019 when world never heard of Corona 19, “Epidemics and Society: “From the Black Death to the Present,” explains how disease outbreaks have affected political scenes, destroyed social barriers, created racial discrimination, increased economic inequality and created or crushed social revolutions.
Snowden explains epidemics through different eras of history, different continents and different classes. Bubonic plague wiped out half of Europe population. There were so many deaths in India that general population thought plague was doing of colonial masters from England. Napoleon thought it was an insult to him when his soldiers were dying of yellow fever in West Indies. Cholera and tuberculosis invaded the world in terrifying ways, but now we classify these diseases as those of poverty and malnutrition.
His investigation in this research touches medical and social issues created from major epidemics like smallpox, cholera, and tuberculosis, Snowden investigates the vast changes brought on humanity by epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, SARS, and Ebola . He questions all nations of the world for their preparedness to counter these epidemics and save humanity.
He has explained his thoughts to the media few days ago about current Corona 19 virus. He says that even though China had botched corona fighting efforts in the beginning trying to control damages highhandedly. But China changed strategy fast enough after February 23, 2020 to control the virus efficiently and cooperate and communicate genuinely, transparently with rest of the world.
World governments still do not seem as prepared as WHO would want to see them to be. Snowden’s final message on corona virus is for all nations is to fight this as a war against all of humanity, regardless of how rich or how poor each nation may be.
Epidemics are a part of human existence. The science of evolution has always known that.
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