 Hi and hello to everyone. I am Ganesh, History Faculty at Shankara's Academy. I hope everyone is safe and healthy. In this present situation where the COVID-19 is spread across the globe, I think this is the right time to discuss about the history of the pandemic. The diseases have ravaged the human civilization and humanity. Even it pushed the human civilization to the near end, but it was not so. The human civilization have continued its progress till date. Let me go to the video session that is the history of the pandemic. First, we need to know what is mean by pandemic. Pandemic means the spread of a disease to a wider geographical region is called as pandemic. For example, COVID-19, which is spread across the entire globe. That's why it is called as pandemic. Very recently, in the northeast of China, in a place called Hameen Manga, the Chinese archaeologists have excavated the place. When they excavated a particular place, they were shocked to see a lot of human skeletons are found in a particular place. When they examined those human skeletons, those skeletons were invariably of young, middle and elderly people. So, they took the samples of those skeletons and the soils of those place and they put it further investigation. They found that because of some kind of disease, the people have put the dead bodies in the particular place and they have abandoned the place 5000 years before the birth of Jesus Christ. So, China is the country which was known for prehistoric epidemic in the world. Next, the plague of Athens. Here, plague means disease, not plague disease. In those days, diseases is also called as they mentioned as plague. In present Greece, 500 years before the birth of Jesus Christ, there were two kingdoms. One was Pata and the other one was Athens. These patterns on Athens were always war with each other. So, the Athens people, in order to protect the people and the city from the Spartans, they built a huge wall around the cities to protect themselves. It was called as long wall. On one of the occasions, the Spartans went for war with the Athens. When the Athens came to know about the arrival of the Spartans, they went behind the wall. The siege continued for many months. Quickly, among the Athens people and the Athens soldiers, they felt their head was heated, they felt the fever in their body, their throat and tongue was inflamed. Quickly, death was fallen over them. This kind of disease was spread quickly among the entire Athens people and the soldiers. The disease spread to the entire Athens city. It continued for few months. The Athens people were died because of this, including the Athens soldiers. Because of this disease, the Athens soldiers were dying and the Athens army was weakened because of this. This was came to know for the Spartans who were waiting outside the war and they break the walls of the Athens and they entered into the Athens city and they have destroyed the Athens city and killed all the Athens soldiers and the people and they captured the Athens city. So, one of the factors that was responsible for the fall of the Athens was this disease and that was a victory for the Spartans. In the later time, the scientists want to know what kind of disease that it was but they cannot able to identify particularly what is a kind of disease. They felt it may be a viral disease which was spread among the Athens people which was responsible for the fall of the Athens city during the time. Next, the plague of Justinian. In present Turkey, 600 years after the birth of Jesus Christ, there were an empire called Byzantine Empire. It is also called as Eastern Roman Empire, simply called as Vons. Its capital was Constantine in Opel which was ruled by a king with the name Justinian. Near the Byzantine Empire, there was another empire that is called as the Sarsenian Empire or the Potion Empire. The geographical countries which present covering the Byzantine and the Potion Empire was Central Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey and Southeast Europe. This was the Byzantine Empire which was existed before 600 years and the Sarsenian Empire was half of Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan very near to the industrial world. This was the Potion Empire. This Byzantine Empire and the Sarsenian Empire was always with war with each other. On one of the occasions, the Byzantines that is Romans, the Romans went for war with the Potions. They defeated the Potions in the war. In Persia, they collected lot of valuables like gold, silver, most particularly the Romans where collected the food grains from the Persia. On their way returning to Constantinople, they collected food grains from Egypt and they went to Constantinople. They victoriously entered into the Constantinople. The celebration continued for months in Constantinople and they don't know. They were carried a disaster within themselves. Disaster, what they carried within themselves was a disease of plague because of the rats which was present in the food grains that was there in the food grains. Constantinople was one of the urbanized cities during the time. Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai and densely populated region. The rodents were hovering there and the rodents spread those diseases among the common people which was densely populated in the Constantinople. Quickly, the plague spread among the Constantinople people. From the Constantinople, it spread to the rest of the Byzantine Empire and the nearby empire of the Sassanin Empire. And day by day, the death was mounted in the Constantinople and in the Sassanin Empire. The church conducted the special prayers and but it was unable to control the disease. Day by day, thousands and thousands of people were died because of this plague. This plague was considered to be as a first pandemic in the history. Because of this, what happened in the history was the economy of the Byzantine Empire was weakened. And because of this, the Iranian Empire was also weakened because of this one. So, this plague disease had completely weakened the empires of the Sassanians and the Byzantine Empire. Next, the Black Death. The first world pandemic and also the most which brought disasters to the world which was spread in the 14th century. The origin point of this Black Death was from the Central Asia. The merchants and the traders carried the goods from the Central Asia and they reached the Black Sea. From the Black Sea, they carried on the ships to Constantinople. From Constantinople, they carried on the goods to ships in the Mediterranean Sea and they reached Italy through the city of Naples, Rome, Venice. From there, the goods were distributed to the entire European continent including Great Britain. In the goods which was distributed by the traders and merchants, the plague disease was there because of the rats. And it quickly spread across the entire European continent. It almost started from 1347 and it continued for many years. And due to the spread of this plague disease, each and every city had that quarantine. The traders merchant had to have, when they come to the city, they have to quarantine themselves for 17 days in the city. But even though they put a lot of restrictions for the traders and merchants and quarantines for the traders and merchants, it was unable to restrict the spread of the disease to the entire European continent. And the people died because of this plague disease. This plague has a size of a tennis ball size in their body and when they burst out, the blood started to ooze out from them. And quickly it brought death to the people. Every city faces the death because of this dreaded plague disease. Even the church conducted the special prayers for this but it was unable to control the spread and the death of this disease. Every government appointed a doctor that was called plague doctors. And that plague doctors have a peculiar type of mask to protect themselves when they were treating the plague patients. It was a birds beak-like mask. In that beak, either they have a scent to overcome the smell or they have medicine to overcome the infection. That mask is still protected in many of the European museums even today. And what change is brought by this plague in the human history? Half of the world population were died because of this plague disease. There was no human to work in agriculture field or work there in the factories. Because of this new inventions and discoveries were emerging in the 15th and 16th century. Those inventions and discoveries laid the foundations for the modern machines. And that modern machine age we called it as an industrial age. That is what we called it as an industrialization. So because of this black dead that it resulted in the form of an emergence of the industrial ages and the industrialization in the history. Next, the American plague here. The American means North America, Central America and the South America. All these were collectively called as Americans. This American plague was spread in the North, Central and South America in the 16th century. In those South America, Central America and North America, many indigenous peoples were lead. They were the Inca emperors, the Mayan emperors and the Aztec emperors. These were the civilization which was existed there. Around 15,000 to 1550, many Europeans started to migrate to the South America, Central America and North America. And they came to settled there. Those indigenous people like Aztecs, Mayans and the Inca people have welcomed those Europeans who came as settlers there. They give a lot of valuable gift to those European settlers but they don't know. Those Europeans are carrying a disaster between themselves. These Europeans who came settled there. A few of the people have cluster of the European diseases like smallpox, chickenpox, tuberculosis, malaria and many other diseases. We know that the tribal people have less immune system and they are very vulnerable to any diseases. And these outsiders that is the Europeans came and settled there. Quickly the infection got into the tribal peoples and it spread among them. Within a century, half of the entire indigenous peoples of the North America, Central America and South America were died. And it was very easy for the Europeans to capture the rest of the people and they made them as a slave and they captured the North America, Central America and South America. As a result of this disease, North America, Central America and South America become colonies of the Europeans. That is a colonization of the Europeans in North America and South America. Next, the Spanish flu of 1918 to 1920. It was spread during the time of the World War I. We know that the World War was the first war which was solved by the human civilization. A major war which brought a lot of disasters to the human civilization. In the first World War, the soldiers were fought in the trench. That was a small trench-like area where the soldiers had to sleep there and they had to fight there. The life of a people was there in the trench itself. During the time of the war, thousands and thousands of soldiers were wounded and a lot of infections was within them. Another thing was, the soldiers were restricted with a small amount of food. The food was rationed to them. They were not fully nutritious among themselves because of the ration of the food. Because of this, the immune systems of the soldiers were very weak. And the less immune system because of the malnourishment among the soldiers resulted in the form of the food among the soldiers. The flu was first pointed out in the American soldiers. From the American soldiers, it was spread to the entire European soldiers. And from there, it spread across the Middle East and Asia. When the First World War was near to the end, the entire world was spread with the flu. And that was a Spanish flu. By the end of the Second World War, by the end of the First World War, the Spanish flu was spread across the entire world. Every girl had a lot of restrictions for the people during the time of the Spanish flu. That was to maintaining the social distance, maintaining the personal hygienic system. When they came out of the house, they had to wear a mask to protect themselves. Even the government had a public notice issue where the schools, the churches, theaters and private halls and their amusements were completely closed on until further notice. Why this name Spanish flu was there? Is it because of bad thing? Everyone thought that because of Spain, this flu was spread. No, that it was not. That is wrong. During the time of the First World War, lot of restrictions was for every country. Spain was the only country where freedom of press was there. They liberally published about the flu. How the death count was there? Because of this, it was called a Spanish flu. Next. H1N1 swine flu of 2009, 2010. The swine flu was one of the pandemic. It was spread from the swine, a viral like infection, and it was spread among the human population. Any people who have a symptom, lost of appetite, have high fever, headache and muscle pain. Even they have a running nose, nausea and diarrhea. These were the symptoms of the swine flu. The origin of the swine flu was from Mexico. It quickly spread from Mexico to the North America and South America. From North America to South America, it spread to Europe and Asia and Australia. So it was one of the epidemic which was considered to be a pandemic in the 21st century. Even not only this swine flu, even we have the Zika virus and the Ebola virus, which is also considered to be a pandemic. The diseases have completely pushed the civilization to the near end of that brick. The human civilization have never bogged down of these devastation. It always bonds back and continued its progress till date. Thank you for watching this video.