A heroic lesson in disease control from the past

With millions of people across the world living with travel and quarantine restrictions as the coronavirus continues to spread, the history of an English village hundreds of years ago may have something to teach us.

Αναπαράσταση σε βιτρώ για τους θανάτους που επέφερε η μαύρη πανώλη του 17ου αιώνα Source: Wikipedia

Bubonic Plague - or The Black Death -   is thought to have wiped out about half the population of England during the first pandemic in the 14th century. 

The disease - caused by a bacteria not a virus - continued to devastate Europe over the next 300 years.

The village of Eyam in Derbyshire in England has gone down in history as a byword for self-sacrifice.

When the plague reached there in 1665 the villagers took the courageous decision to seal themselves off from the outside world, preventing the disease spreading to nearby communities.

But in doing so, many signed their own death warrants.