
Worst Epidemics in History - justinzollars
https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-10-worst-epidemics-in-history.html
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dmix
I was reading about this interesting fungal infection that primarily infects
people with HIV/AIDS:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptococcosis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptococcosis)

You can get it via inhalation and most commonly comes (at least for westerns)
from people visiting places like South East Asia. The mortality rates are
super high around 30-70%.

It must suck to have HIV, so many things can kill you, it's like handcuffs
which prevent a lot of personal freedom.

I read about an HIV-infected doctor who got infected from attending a
microbiology conference which had samples on display.

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tetris11
The Spanish Flu was one of the rarer ones that appeared to target only young
healthy adults, but its believed that this was due to the Russian Flu
weakening the immune systems of that generation first when they were children.

[https://www.realclearscience.com/articles/2017/11/13/why_did...](https://www.realclearscience.com/articles/2017/11/13/why_did_so_many_young_people_die_from_the_spanish_flu_110453.html)

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ninguem2
What's up with the commas in 10,00,00,000?

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stefanix
It's the author giving you a hint that what follows is over 9000.

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lawlorino
Please don't try to turn HN into Reddit.

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teshier-A
How was this published with wrong numbers? A simple wikipedia search gives you
different estimates (parentheses)

Plague of Justinian 541-542 100,000,000 (25-50M)

Black Plague 1346-1350 50,000,000 (75-200M)

1918 Flu (Spanish Flu) 1918-1920 20,000,000 (50-100M)

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onetimemanytime
what makes you think that Wikipedia has the right numbers? (if there is a
discrepancy to begin with?)

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teshier-A
There is a discrepancy, and Wikipedia is sourced... pretty hard to back the
other one in this case isn't it ?

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JoeAltmaier
Earlier epidemics were larger in a population-percentage sense. So much worse
virality than later ones by far?

And I'd add another 'epidemic': WWII which spread across the planet, killing I
think 56M?

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ot8
"Spanish flu" is something of a misnomer.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu)

\---

To maintain morale, wartime censors minimized early reports of illness and
mortality in Germany, the United Kingdom, France, and the United
States.[10][11] Papers were free to report the epidemic's effects in neutral
Spain (such as the grave illness of King Alfonso XIII).[12] These stories
created a false impression of Spain as especially hard hit,[13] thereby giving
rise to the pandemic's nickname, "Spanish flu".[14]

...

The major troop staging and hospital camp in Étaples, France, was identified
by researchers as being at the center of the Spanish flu.

\---

So actually the "French Flu"

