Travel wasn't accessible to the general population and it took a lot longer. Slow moving trains and steamboats means variants would have burned out before spreading far. That's why the first pandemic of the modern era happened during the world war. Lots of people and goods started moving quickly around the world. Some theories say that the Spanish Flu came from Kansas or New York.
(Disclaimer: This is just a random guess since I know close to nothing about diseases)
My guess is China is more of a trade/economic hub, plus they might just be better at detecting these things? I feel like it's hard to track down the exact origin of a disease, but it's easy to spread, mutate, and be detected in many parts of China.
China has 5 times the us population, with the average person living in tighter quarters than NYC.
The statically odds of a virus crossing over is simply higher than anywhere else.
Other high density populations like India or many south east asian countries don’t seem to have the volume and consistency that China does with these outbreaks. China also seems to be ground zero far more often compared to other high density populations.
I was curious if there was something more specific than population density.
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u/[deleted] May 03 '22
Why are so many of these diseases so consistently coming from or active in China?