The COVID-19 pandemic which has taken over the planet began with a small cluster of cases first thought to be pneumonia in Wuhan in December 2019. By early January, a new coronavirus was known to be the cause. But by then, the virus had spread around the city and beyond, and officials had a major outbreak of a mysterious, deadly disease on their hands. Authorities scrambled to contain the outbreak, cordoning off and locking down Wuhan, the first COVID-19 hotspot. The world looked on in horror, hoping the disease would not spread further. By late February, the worst fears were confirmed as northern Italy, the country’s economic powerhouse became the next hotspot, and on 08 March Italian authorities imposed a Wuhan-style lockdown of its own, affecting over 16 million people. The rest of the country would also shut down within days as the deadly extent of the outbreak became painfully clear. The disease had now arrived in Europe. Within a matter of days, the virus had spread and exploded in Spain, Europe’s second hotspot. Spanish authorities were forced to impose the same kinds of restrictions as Italy on its own clusters in Madrid and Barcelona, where the cases and deaths were rapidly multiplying and pushing hospitals and care homes to breaking point. Before long, the pandemic had spread and exploded in the Americas, with the United States and New York City, in particular, seeing surging death tolls as it soon became the worst affected country in the world.