COVID-19 far from the most devastating pandemic the world has experienced | Opinion

Don’t get me wrong, the COVID-19 pandemic is the worst global tragedy in many years, and it may get worse. But, contrary to much of the apocalyptic talk in social media, the current crisis is likely to be much less devastating — in human lives and economic destruction — than other big pandemics of the past.

That’s the feeling I got after interviewing about a dozen leading international historians and economists in recent days. Most agree on one thing: We may see a global recovery relatively soon, unless major countries relax their prevention measures and stop asking people to observe social distancing.

John M. Barry, author of “The Great Influenza: The story of the greatest pandemic in history,” currently one of the top nonfiction books on The New York Times’ bestsellers list, told me that COVID-19 “is a very serious pandemic, but nothing like the 1918 one.”

He reminded me that the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic killed between 50 million and 100 million people worldwide. Adjusted to the world’s population today, that would be between 220 million and 440 million deaths. “Fortunately, we’re not looking at that kind of death toll, even in a worst case,” he said.

At the time of this writing, 360,000 people worldwide have died of COVID-19, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Although millions could possibly die from the current pandemic if there is a second wave, it’s still going to be a small percentage of those who died in 1918, Barry told me.

Also, HIV/AIDS killed about 36 million people between 2005 and 2012. The bubonic plague, or Black Death pandemic of 1346, is believed to have killed between 75 million and 200 million people.

Regarding COVID-19’s economic toll, it’s probably the biggest economic crisis in nearly a century. But top international financial institutions agree that it will be much shorter than the 1929 Great Depression, or the 2008 financial crisis.

While the Great Depression lasted 10 years, and the financial crisis lasted between two and three years, this one is expected to last one year.

The International Monetary Fund said in its April 14 annual economic forecast that the world economy will contract by 3 percent this year, and grow by 5.8 percent next year. In 2020, the U.S. economy is likely to grow by 4.7 percent, China’s economy will expand by 9.2 percent and Latin America’s will expand by 3.4 percent, it said.

However, these forecasts are likely to be revised downward later this year, officials at the International Monetary Fund told me. Still, the IMF, the World Bank and most major private banks are still predicting a relatively rapid economic rebound in 2021.

“We are about to see the best economic data we’ve seen in the history of this country,” former Obama administration economist and Harvard professor Jason Furman said in a Zoom speech in April, Politico.com reported.

The months preceding the November election could offer President Trump the chance to brag about the most explosive monthly employment numbers and gross domestic product growth ever, Furman told Politico.com. Of course, those figures would be misleading, because they would only take into account a few months, rather than an entire year.

But the point is that even some former Obama administration economists are foreseeing an economic rebound soon, because — much like after hurricanes or other natural disasters — there will be a frenzy of spending after it had been deferred. And some are even forecasting a more lasting recovery. Remember, after the terrible 1919 pandemic, came the roaring ’20s.

Let’s put things in perspective. This is a terrible crisis, aggravated by Trump’s disastrously slow response, which, according to a Columbia University study, resulted in 36,000 American deaths. And things may get worse over the next three weeks in Latin America and Africa before the contagion curve start to move downward worldwide.

But don’t allow this crisis to paralyze you, and don’t bet on a steadily worsening global catastrophe. As bad as things are, this is not the 1918 influenza pandemic, and it may not last as long as the biggest economic crises in modern history.

Don’t miss the “Oppenheimer Presenta” TV show at 10 p.m. E.T. Sunday on CNN en Español. Twitter: @oppenheimera