Pandemics | Ngā mate urutā

The COVID-19 pandemic was not the first to strike humanity. Once humans began living in close quarters and sharing resources, it became easier for infections to move through populations. As trade expanded, it not only spread goods and ideas but also created new opportunities for contact between humans and animals, accelerating the emergence of epidemics. Wars, migrations and pilgrimages were also important vectors for disease transmission.¹ Diseases like malaria, tuberculosis, leprosy, influenza, plague and smallpox began to spread more easily during these early periods of settled life. As cities grew and trade routes expanded, increasing contact with different populations of people, animals and ecosystems, pandemics became more common.

1 Sheilagh Ogilvie, Controlling Contagion – Epidemics and Institutions from the Black Death to Covid
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2025)