What do you know about the pandemic?

A pandemic (/pænˈdɛmɪk/ pan-DEM-ik) is an epidemic of an infectious disease that has spread across a large region, for instance multiple continents or worldwide, affecting a substantial number of individuals. Widespread endemic diseases with a stable number of infected individuals such as recurrences of seasonal influenza are generally excluded as they occur simultaneously in large regions of the globe rather than being spread worldwide.

Throughout human history, there have been a number of pandemics of diseases such as smallpox. The most fatal pandemic in recorded history was the Black Death—also known as The Plague—which killed an estimated 75–200 million people in the 14th century. The term had not been used then but was used for later epidemics, including the 1918 influenza pandemic—more commonly known as the Spanish flu.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, recently 194 member states of the World Health Organization began negotiations on an International Treaty on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response with a requirement to submit a draft of this treaty to the 77th World Health Assembly during its 2024 convention. This is expected to set rules for dealing with a pandemic by the international community