Pandemic meaning (what is it, concept and definition)

What is a Pandemic:

Pandemic is the international spread of a new disease where most do not yet have immunity against it.

The pandemic is a public health emergency. It is characterized by causing many serious cases that, although they may represent a small percentage of the population, indicate a constant and unsolvable vulnerability.

The influenza viruses that have caused pandemics in the past come from influenza viruses that infect animals, such as avian influenza.

Examples of pandemics

Pandemics are characterized by covering different and extensive geographical areas, such as:

• Smallpox: contagion through body fluids and direct contact. The survival rate was 30%. Today it is eradicated. Measles: contagion by direct contact and by air. Inflammation of the lungs or meninges caused death. Spanish flu of 1918: the first outbreak arose in France and spread to Spain. It caused 50 to 100 million deaths. Black plague or bubonic plague: it is caused by the Yersinia pestis bacteria and its contagion is through parasites such as the flea. AIDS: HIV infection. It was considered the fifth global pandemic and killed more than 25 million people. Typhus: caused by the Rickettsia bacteria, it spread through the countries of the European and American continent. Cholera: contagion by Vibrio cholerae bacteria still unleashes outbreaks of sporadic epidemics. H1N1 influenza: Epidemiologists consider it a mutation of influenza pandemics that occurs every 10 to 15 years. The Spanish flu can be one of them.

Difference between pandemic and epidemic

The pandemic is the spread of epidemics globally. For this reason, the pandemic is also called a global epidemic or a global epidemic.

Epidemics are outbreaks of disease at the local level. It may be an infection known as, for example, the flu. Flu epidemics become a pandemic when the virus takes on different epidemiological characteristics than those known and spreads over large regions.

See also:

• Epidemic, Plague, Quarantine.