The Black Death and COVID-19

In most cases, humans make decisions to help them survive. During the Black Death and Covid periods of history many people made choices to try to keep themselves alive and their families safe. In the video, it talked about how people were not the same socially after the Black Death and how they had a mistrust of people that wasn’t there before, which is not necessarily the same case after Covid. After watching and reading about the Black Death I saw many similarities and differences to Covid 19. In the video it discussed the different things that people would try to do to stop the spread of the Black Death. Some examples of what people tried included, boxing themselves in their homes, holding posies over their noses, not bathing, and trying many other options to cure themselves. This is similar to the way things were during Covid 19 since during the virus times people were told to wear masks over their faces to stop the spread and to stay inside as much as possible. During the time of the Black Death people blamed the Jews for spreading the plague. This is similar to the fact that people blamed the Chinese for starting Covid 19. Neither of these claims were backed up by actual facts. However, the Black Death and Covid 19 have many differences. Since the Black Death was during the middle ages, the technology and scientific advancements were not to the level that they are today. In the video, they talked about how it took 500 years to figure out what started the Black Death whereas it took about 2 years to come up with a vaccine to help prevent Covid from spreading as aggressively. In the source, The Decameron, it talks about how if infected, tumors would form in the groin or the armpits. The Black Death infected and killed a significant portion of the population. Covid did not exactly have the same effects. It would target the lungs and the most common deaths were among older people or those with compromised immune systems. The Black Death was far more deadly and gruesome than Covid was. However, if there were the same advancements in technology and scientific research in the middle ages as exists today then it is very possible the Black Death would not have been as widespread and deadly as what occurred in history.