Before coronavirus, the last truly global pandemic to bring about similar devastation was the Spanish Flu outbreak which lasted between 1918 and 1920.
Breaking out at the end of World War One before spreading rapidly across the world, an estimated 500 million people - or around one-third of the planet's population - were infected by a strain of influenza.
Between 20 and 50 million people are thought to have died in the crisis, which started in Europe before being transmitted to the United States and parts of Asia.
More people were killed in a single year than in the entire Black Death of 1347 to 1351. Around 10-20% of those infected died and by the time it was eradicated, barely any country in the world had been untouched by the
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