3.4 | The Black Death
The Black Death (1347–1352) killed 40% of Europeans. The medical community had limited expertise and was unaware of the disease’s transmission via black rat fleas. There were no preventive measures in place, and quarantine wasn’t even used until 1377.. Black buboes spread throughout the body, turning it black. The symptoms were scary. The death rate was similar across groups. The economy of Europe was badly hit. noted that uncollected crops caused food costs to rise in rural regions . Trade was interrupted in cities. Nominal wages went up sharply due to the scarcity of labor.
An estimated one-third of the world’s population (200 million) died in just four years due to the Black Death. The exact cause of the plague’s end is unknown. However, it is generally agreed that people who survived the pandemic acquired immunity.  Unfortunately, the original plague never vanished; it returned 800 years later. Armed forces, colonizers, and traders seem to have imported and exported the disease on ships and land, allowing for much quicker transmission of infections than during the last epidemic. People also learned to travel farther and faster and build larger towns. Although the disease’s transmission was known to be correlated with proximity, there was still no knowledge of how to stop it. Emergency public health precautions were implemented soon after the plague reached Europe, like today’s social distancing. ‘Quarantine,’ deriving from the Venetian term ‘quarantine,’ warranted 40 days of waiting for ships to offload passengers at the port of Venice and other ports to make sure that no one was bringing the plague to the city.
Undoubtedly, the Black Death was more disastrous than Covid-19. It led to much more fatality than Covid-19. Unlike Covid-19, it had little effect on the victims’ age, socioeconomic level, and health prior to contracting the disease. After the Black Death, bubonic plague outbreaks continued for centuries. In general, the epidemic only struck a few towns at a time, and mortality was far lower than it was during the original pandemic. However, the poor were disproportionately impacted.