If you studied English at secondary school during the 1990s, there is every possibility you will remember reading the book, Empty World, by John Christopher.
The book tells of a disease which originates in Asia before rapidly spreading across the world and devastating the global population. Although published in 1977, the book obviously has plenty of resonance to anyone reading in 2020 as the world struggles to tackle the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic.
The novella focuses on a teenaged boy, Neil Miller. Neil is living with his elderly parents after having been orphaned in a road accident when he first begins to hear news reports of a new mysterious disease coming out of India. Initially, just a minor story chuntering away in the background, concern rises as the news coverage gradually reveals that the ‘Calcutta Plague’ spreads further and further across the world. Soon there are rumours it has arrived in Britain. Neil’s grandfather is old enough to remember the Second World War. He suggests spreading rumours should be made into a punishable offence again, as it was then.
Soon the Calcutta Plague’s presence in Britain is beyond doubt. One of Neil’s elderly teachers succumbs to it, as do both his grandparents. The disease takes the form of a fever, before generating symptoms which appear to emulate a very rapid version of the ageing process. This is not very similar to COVID-19 at all, although the fictional plague does attack older people first. Eventually, it becomes clear that it is infecting pretty much everyone including some children Neil knows of his own age (fifteen) and younger. This resembles the progress of COVID-19 in some respects. The elderly are undoubtedly being hit harder by the virus although contrary to early rumour, children can get it badly and die from it too.
The key difference, however, is that while the vast, overwhelming majority of people who get COVID-19 survive, with the exception of a few random people like Neil who get the initial fever but subsequently seem to be immune, the fictional Calcutta Plague kills anyone who gets it. As the title of the book suggests, the story is essentially apocalyptic. Neil finds himself roaming or driving down completely empty streets, looting empty shops and battling an inevitable brief explosion in the rat population, the disease having killed nearly every human on the Earth.
As terrible as the current COVID-19 pandemic is, we should be grateful it is not quite as bad as that.
Chris Hallam's World View 