COMPARISON OF 1981 H1NI PANDEMIC AND COVID-19
Students’ Name;
Abstract
Today the world is facing the COVID-19 pandemic, which has infected over 3.25 million people and leads to death of over 231 thousand people. The pandemic has halted the economic progress of many countries as many businesses have closed down except for businesses offering essential services such as hospitals. People are working from home as one of the measures to fight the spread of the illness. Governments are also coming up with policies on social distancing and quarantine. These measures take as back to the 1918 Spanish flu caused by the H1N1 virus. 2020 marks 102 years after this pandemic. The Spanish flu is recorded as the most terrific pandemic because it caused estimated deaths of around 50 million people which was 2.7% of the world population. To combat the Spanish flu measures being taken today to combat and reduce the spread of COVID-19 were taken. This similarity of the methods leaves the question; how is the Spanish flu related to COVID-19 and how the two pandemics are different. The question between the similarities and differences of the viruses that caused these pandemics is also asked. To answer these questions, this paper will give a comparison of the 1918 H1N1 pandemic and the COVID-19 pandemic
Keywords: H1NI virus, Spanish flu, influenza, COVID-19, pandemic, SARS-CoV-2 infection, 1918
Currently, the world is COVID-19 which is caused by the novel coronavirus. As of May 4, 2020, the world has recorded a total of 3.25 million cases. Out of these 1.01million people have recovered, and 231 thousand people have died. The united states as of now are leading with over 1.09 million people confirmed to have the virus, 128000 of these have recovered, and 63,538 people have died (2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data, 2020). Most countries and states population are under semi quarantine. Social distancing is being significantly encouraged. The pandemic has led to the closure of most business except for business offering essential services such as the hospitals. Many people have taken a step to work from their homes if they can. The goal of quarantine, working from home, and social distancing is to reduce the transmission of this disease (Wilder-Smith and Freedman., 2020). If the measures are not taken then, the hospitals will be overwhelmed with people who require care and those diagnosed with this disease. By ‘flattening the curve’ the spread will be controlled, and cases will be spread out for a more extended period to give hospitals and healthcare entities ability to manage the cases better.
A journal by Peter Cohan,2020 has covered how the COVID- 19 pandemics will affect the economy. He includes the effect on the employment rates urging that the employment rates will increase. Goldman Sachs projected that unemployment in the U.S. would spike to 15% in the second quarter of 2020, according to CNBC. However, The St. Louis Federal Reserve estimated in March 2020 that the unemployment rate could hit a whopping 32% amid 47 million layoffs, according to CNBC.
Comparison of COVID-19 and Spanish flu of 1918
Over the last few centuries, the world has faced several pandemics. One of the worst of these pandemics was the Spanish flu as known by many.it was a 1918 influenza pandemic. The pandemic was caused by H1N1 virus whose origin was traced back to birds. The first identification of the virus was in the military personnel of the united states. The pandemic was named the Spanish flu because people thought it had a Spain origin through research carried out in 2005 suggested its origin was New York. Another reason for it being named the Spanish flu is because during the world war Spain reported about the sternness of the pandemic while other countries involved in the war were not disclosing how the illness was affecting their citizens. They suppressed reports of the disease (Enserink, M., 2004. pp.394.)
The Spanish flu infected a third of the world population which at the time was estimated to be 500 million. This was at its peak. The deaths over the pandemic were more than 50 million, as explained by Nancy Bristow’s book “American Pandemic: The Lost Worlds of the 1918 Influenza Epidemic” (Oxford University Press, 2016). The fatality rate of the pandemic was estimated to be 2%. The number of deaths estimated varies in different researches; for example, in the united states, some researchers suggest deaths were about 17.4 million, while others suggest 100 million. (Viboud, et al., 2016, pp.738-745).
Even though it is a moving target as more passing’s happening. More extensive diagnostic testing is done, finding more significant levels of contamination, in some cases without any symptoms, the worldwide casualty rate for COVID-19 is about 5% (Baud et al., 2020), even though in the U.S. it is approximately 2.16%. A few specialists accept the 5% figure is fundamentally lower as a result of questions about the exactness of China’s announcing of the cases, where COVID-19 began.
The fatality rate of the COVID-19 is estimated to be 1%, ten times fatality rate of seasonal influenza which was 0.1% by some experts such as Anthony Fauci who is the head of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the United States. ( Roser et al., 2020)
Another similarity of H1N1 and coronavirus is they are both ‘novel’ which means that in they are new and no person is immune to them (Yu, Zhu, Zhang and Han, 2020). One of the significant differences between the viruses is that the H1N1 virus affected healthy adults of age 20-40 years. The mortality was higher in young people of less than five years and those above 65 years. COVID-19 is primarily affecting adults of over 65 years of age with health conditions. It has milder symptoms in children
At the time of the pandemic, the Spanish flu had no vaccine as it is so with the COVID-19 pandemic. The lack of antibiotics to treat and control infections resulting from bacteria made the Spanish flu very fatal. To manage its isolation, quarantine and barning gatherings were some of the methods used. The first vaccine to prevent infection of the Spanish flu came in the 1940s.
The 1918 Spanish flu ended in the summer of 1919, mostly, Healthline reports, due to deaths and higher immunity levels (Cottrell, T.C., 2018). Christine Kreuder Johnson, a University of California – Davis professor of epidemiology and ecosystem health and a researcher on USAID’s Emerging Pandemic Threats PREDICT project, said that another thing to take into consideration for the 1918 pandemic was the world was in the middle of a war and soldiers were spreading the virus globally. People also lived in crowded conditions and had poor hygiene.
As of now, 3.25 million cases have been confirmed of people infected with COVID-19 in the world, with a total of 1.01 million recovered cases and 231000 deaths. At the time of the Spanish flu, the world population was estimated to be 1.8 billion. The estimated mortality of around 50 million caused by the Spanish flu converts to 2.7% of the worldwide community, while 17.4 million estimate converts to 1% (Johnson. and Mueller, 2002. Pp 110).
The world population as of now is estimated to be 8 billion with COVID-19 deaths being significantly low. Though the disease is not over the small number of deaths is due to the knowledge and awareness of how such pandemics are transmitted, sound healthcare systems in terms of accessibility and availability of antibiotics and other drugs to help combat the illness by reducing its impact on an individual. Despite the fact that COVID-19 has led to the stretching of facilities in the healthcare sector, the situation was worse in the era of the Spanish flu as hospitals were crowded due to causalities of war and much medical personnel were with the armies. The COVID-19 spread has been made easier by modern transport methods such as aeroplanes and denser populations.
Even though there are a lot of similarities between Spanish flu caused by the H1N1 virus and COVID-19 caused by a coronavirus, there are significant disparities between them. First, both pandemics are as a result of different viruses with unlike acting methods. Spanish flu was influenza, but the COVID-19 is similar to chronic, acute pneumonia. (Lai et al., 2020 p.105-924).
The second difference is in the capacity of scientists to marshal innovation and science to create and additionally test drugs for the sickness rapidly, has never been as robust as it is presently. There are more than 100 progressing clinical preliminaries worldwide of test and as of now endorsed drugs that may be repurposed to battle COVID-19. There are many organizations all-inclusive chipping away at creating immunizations against the SARS-CoV-2 infection that are currently in clinical preliminaries may be accessible to fight a second influx of the malady, despite the fact that that will rely upon when or if there is a subsequent wave and when or if a preventive drug is created. Specialists accept a subsequent wave is conceivable in the fall of 2020, and most hopeful projections don’t have an immunization accessible until mid-2021, even though that will rely a lot upon the kinds of advancements available, preliminary clinical outcomes, and the world’s eagerness to surge guidelines even with a crisis.
One of the essential pharmaceutical medicines for Spanish influenza was aspirin, which had been trademarked by Bayer in 1899. However, the patent expired in 1917, permitting organizations to manufacture it. At that point, clinical experts were prescribing as much as 30 grams of aspirin day by day, which we presently know is poisonous—dosages over four grams are dangerous. Aspirin harming indications incorporate hyperventilation, and aspiratory edema, such vast numbers of clinical history specialists accept a considerable lot of the passing from the Spanish influenza was either caused or quickened by excessive administration of aspirin.
Worldwide correspondence and sharing of data are additionally altogether better than in 1918, which has seen specialists sharing information on the pandemic, the infection and various medications, and governments doing likewise
Conclusion and outlook
The COVID-19 plague is beyond question a great and novel test around the world, and the fight is not even close to being finished. Be that as it may, there are signs that government arrangements in a few nations, including Germany and South Korea, have had the option to contain the infection, and news around a few antiviral medication preliminaries, for example, Gilead Sciences’ remdesivir, are usual in the following not many weeks, should give individuals hope. Indeed, even in China, where the pandemic seems to have started, appears to be three months after the fact, to have things to a great extent levelled out.
By observing the various guidelines on preventing the spread of COVID-19, we can reduce the infection rate to significantly low levels. The continued medical researches being done to get a vaccine for this illness are a source of hope to people around the world.
A more important fact to note is that even though COVID-19 has many similarities with the Spanish flu, the two illnesses are different and are caused by different viruses whose methods of action are different. It is also important to note that what has been learnt from the 1918 flu is that pandemics do end even if with a large number of deaths, they eventually end.
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