PANDEMIC, EPIDEMIC, ENDEMIC

Since the 14th Century, plagues and pandemics have had lasting impacts on humanity’s development - most prominently through the creation of dedicated healthcare infrastructure.

The first hospitals and healing practices were built out of reactive necessity; either to help or hide the sick. The earliest were founded in religious buildings, or funded by ‘the Church’.

The spread of foreign illness was catalysed by trade. In 1348, Venice began to hold inbound ships in isolation for forty days to contain an outbreak of plague; hence the first ‘quarantine’, derived from Italian ‘forty days’.

STRUCTURE & DESIGN

What do free-standing wardrobes, powder rooms, and linoleum tiles have in common?

We have been adapting our surroundings to better prepare for - or, deal with - mass health threats for centuries, and these are all examples of the output. Free-standing wardrobes represent an easier-to-clean solution than their built-in Victorian predecessors; powder rooms were an opportunity to effectively hose down staff and visitors.

Linoleum tiles and flooring, like those seen (below left) in Charing Cross hospital, were introduced to make germs visible - and get rid of them to prevent spread of illness.

In 1918, influenza triggered the need for better ventilation as people realised the challenge of disease spreading in the air. The public was encouraged to keep homes ventilated, which kept the air fresh but made homes cold - and subsequently the home heat radiator appeared.

HEALTH AND INNOVATION

Accelerated advancement and widespread adoption of healthcare innovation, both medical and technological, is surely the most prominent and beneficial change of any pandemic.

PERSONAL CHANGE, MICRO & MACRO

It’s no wonder that pandemics shake up behaviours.

Experiencing a major life event makes us more likely to change a behaviour, because we’re more open to changing habits when our surrounding environment changes.

Look again at Covid. Divorce rates (or at least divorce intent) spiked throughout the early pandemic stages (top right). We also witnessed the Great Resignation - a flurry of career switches with applicant confidence to match.

Arguably, it’s a chain reaction; macro decisions form triggers for micro decisions. The likelihood of trying a new brand is 2.5 times higher among people who had experienced a significant life event compared to those who hadn’t.

We’re creatures of habit. Or, of habitually breaking habits.

HEALTH & PERSONAL CARE

In the beauty sector, the pandemic saw sales shift from typical cosmetics towards more holistic selfcare - a trend that’s expected to last.

According to Reportlinker, products in the self care and hygiene space are expected to result in a compound annual growth rate of 38.4% between 2019 and 2027 to reach $9.4bn; likely due to the shift in awareness of personal hygiene and subsequent demand.

BUT WILL IT LAST?

While changes to our surroundings (materials; interior design) are more permanent by nature, and the increase of some of our big COVID-triggered personal decisions (the housing boom; birth rates) - though permanently impacting the course of individual lives - has now slowed, day-to-day behaviours are trickier to predict.

Here’s my take.

Small behaviours will stay, big behaviours won't.

We’ve already seen that self-care is expected to continue growing in important, and I think a safe prediction is that small changes will stick around - we'll sanitise more than before, and be more conscious of distance and unmasked coughing - but the divorce-baby-housing boom is over already, and unlikely to return.

We'll continue to innovate and be better prepared next time.

There will be a next time (sorry). But when it comes around, we are now fundamentally better prepared for another big shift. We might not like it, but at least being housebound is a more familiar concept than it was in March 2020.

I'd like to think we have emerged from the pandemic more empathetic, understanding people.

But only time will tell if we have it in us to continue progressing our relationships with each other, as much as we seem to do with the world.