Juval Harari: “Coronavirus will win the greatest victory if he can even divide us”

In the Pandemia of Coronavirus, many blame globalization. They believe that the only way to prevent such epidemics is “deglobalization”. To build walls, limit travel and trade. If short -term quarantine is really needed to suspend the spread of the threat, then long -term insulation will only lead to an economic collapse - without providing any protection against infectious diseases. On the contrary: a real antidote from the epidemic is not segregation, but cooperation, says Israeli historian and philosopher Yuval Harari in a new article for Time magazine .

The epidemics killed people in millions long before globalization. In the XIV century there were no aircraft or cruise ships, but black death managed to get from East Asia to Western Europe in almost 10 years. Among its victims are from 75 to 200 million people. In March 1520, OSPU was brought to Mexico, and in almost a year she destroyed a third of the population of Central America. In 1918, especially the virulent strain of influenza ( Spanish flu ) over several months reached the most distant corners of the world, infecting half a billion man. This pandemic has become more deadly than the entire First World War.

Thanks to the improvement of transport communication and the growth of the planet’s population, over the eyelids that has passed after meeting with the Spanish, humanity has become even more vulnerable to epidemics. The modern metropolis (like Tokyo) gives pathogens much more fertile ground for growth and reproduction than medieval Florence. Thanks to the air community, the virus can reach very quickly, say, from Paris to Moscow. Therefore, we, it would seem, should live in a real infectious hell - when another epidemic follows, and so without end.

Subscribe to read the whole

Make a subscription Redefine.media to read Republic

Subscribe [you can pay for a Russian or foreign card. The subscription is extended automatically. You can unsubscribe at any time.]

Where are the money subscribers going

Most Republic materials are available by paid subscription. We believe that this is a good way to finance media. After all, as you know, if you have not paid for reading it, then someone else paid for you to read it. In our case, everything is honest: from your money, salaries and fees are paid to journalists, and they write about important and interesting topics for you.

The key feature of our subscription: your money is distributed between Republic magazines depending on how you read it. If you read the materials of one magazine, then your money will go only to him, while others will not go. That is, you finance only what you are interested in.

Republic uses the Redefine.media subscription. For design, we will redirect you to the Redefine.media website, where you will need to register and pay for the subscription. Authorization on the Redefine.Media website will allow you to read Republic materials from the same device.

A year subscription is more profitable than a month. And if you want to unsubscribe, this can always be done in your personal account.