A Historial Perspective by Dr. Alan Glazier, OD
Just over 100 years ago we dealt with the first major pandemic of the post-industrialized world, the 1918 influenza pandemic. This pandemic claimed 50 million lives or 2.5% of the world’s population at the time. The flu came in three waves, the first being relatively mild, then approximately 5 months later a second wave that was more lethal and a third and final wave in early 1919 that was intermediate in severity between the two. It was the worst pandemic since the black death, approximately 500 years earlier. Studying past pandemics and extrapolating social and economic changes that occurred post-pandemic offer some window into what our post COVID world might look like, for better or worse. Fortunately, there were many positive changes to society that came out of an even worse pandemic. Read more