Deadly Outbreak Research Articles

KAP study on hand hygiene in the era post COVID-19 SARS among general population.

Background: Hand hygiene accounts one of the most effective ways of keeping diseases at bay. As of now, this practice stands as a key cornerstone post COVID-19 era, thus helping to break the chain of contact transmission of such deadly outbreak’s outcome. Aims and Objectives: To assess knowledge, attitude and practices (KAP) relating to hand hygiene among general population post COVID-19 era. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was done among general population of our setup over a span of 2 months by distributing online a pre-designed, pre-validated and semi-structured Google Form survey questionnaire having questions based on knowledge (10), attitude (07) and practices (06) relating to hand hygiene post COVID-19 era. Individuals enrolled were tech-savvy with access to e-mail and internet facility, and able to understand English language. Results: Data from responses of 545 individuals among our general community was collected and analyzed, out of which majority (88.9%) responders already had a basic insight about hand hygiene. 91.2% responders clearly believed hand hygiene is important to prevent the infection spread from contact. While 25.7% responders answered 40-60 seconds as minimum time required for hand washing, comparable majority (48.9%) marked it as 20-40 seconds. 70.9% responders were strongly against use of gloves as a substitute for hand washing. Interestingly, many had a mixed say regarding time span for which an alcohol-based hand sanitizer be rubbed onto hands viz. 32.3% stating it as 10 seconds, 27.7% as 20 seconds, 21.2% as 5 seconds and 18.8% as 15 seconds, respectively. Majority (85.4%) voted hand washing as better and probably the best mode of maintaining hand hygiene. Majority (93.1%) responders felt the need of practicing hand hygiene possibly at all the times. While most of our study population practiced hand hygiene thoroughly, 77.5% responders said that it positively affected their life also. However, in contrast, only 57.4% responders washed their hands after using public transport/money exchange, while 39.3% practiced it only sometimes. Conclusion: Our study highlights that despite of a positive relation between the awareness among general masses with regard to positive attitude about hand hygiene post COVID era, there was a mixed response about practice of the same, thus stressing on the need to reinforce such practices with due clarity so that the message goes loud and clear among public at large for breaking the chain of COVID transmission till date. Further our study can aid decision-makers in forecasting the effectiveness of infection mitigation strategies or in defining valid changes based on the practices, attitudes, and understanding of the intended population.

Amphibian mast cells serve as barriers to chytrid fungus infections

Global amphibian declines are compounded by deadly disease outbreaks caused by the chytrid fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd). Much has been learned about the roles of amphibian skin-produced antimicrobial components and microbiomes in controlling Bd, yet almost nothing is known about the roles of skin-resident immune cells in anti-Bd defenses. Mammalian mast cells reside within and serve as key immune sentinels in barrier tissues like skin. Accordingly, we investigated the roles of Xenopus laevis frog mast cells during Bd infections. Our findings indicate that enrichment of X. laevis skin mast cells confers anti-Bd protection and ameliorates the inflammation-associated skin damage caused by Bd infection. This includes a significant reduction in infiltration of Bd-infected skin by neutrophils, promoting mucin content within cutaneous mucus glands, and preventing Bd-mediated changes to skin microbiomes. Mammalian mast cells are known for their production of the pleiotropic interleukin-4 (IL4) cytokine and our findings suggest that the X. laevis IL4 plays a key role in manifesting the effects seen following cutaneous mast cell enrichment. Together, this work underscores the importance of amphibian skin-resident immune cells in anti-Bd defenses and illuminates a novel avenue for investigating amphibian host–chytrid pathogen interactions.

Amphibian mast cells serve as barriers to chytrid fungus infections.

Global amphibian declines are compounded by deadly disease outbreaks caused by the chytrid fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd). Much has been learned about the roles of amphibian skin-produced antimicrobial components and microbiomes in controlling Bd, yet almost nothing is known about the roles of skin-resident immune cells in anti-Bd defenses. Mammalian mast cells reside within and serve as key immune sentinels in barrier tissues like skin. Accordingly, we investigated the roles of Xenopus laevis frog mast cells during Bd infections. Our findings indicate that enrichment of X. laevis skin mast cells confers anti-Bd protection and ameliorates the inflammation-associated skin damage caused by Bd infection. This includes a significant reduction in infiltration of Bd-infected skin by neutrophils, promoting mucin content within cutaneous mucus glands, and preventing Bd-mediated changes to skin microbiomes. Mammalian mast cells are known for their production of the pleiotropic interleukin-4 (IL4) cytokine and our findings suggest that the X. laevis IL4 plays a key role in manifesting the effects seen following cutaneous mast cell enrichment. Together, this work underscores the importance of amphibian skin-resident immune cells in anti-Bd defenses and illuminates a novel avenue for investigating amphibian host-chytrid pathogen interactions.

The Covid-19 Pandemic: The deadly coronavirus outbreak, Second Edition

The Covid-19 Pandemic: The deadly coronavirus outbreak, Second Edition

Phytocompounds as versatile drug-leads targeting mProtease in the SARS-CoV-2 virus: insights from a molecular dynamics study

SARS-CoV-2 is one of the deadly outbreaks in the present era and still showing its presence around the globe. Researchers have produced various vaccines that offer protection against infection, but we have not yet found a cure for COVID-19. Currently, efforts are focused on identifying effective therapeutic approaches to treat this infectious disease. In the present work, we investigated the main protease (Mpro) protein, a crucial component in SARS-CoV-2 viral particle formation, as a drug target and proposed phytocompounds with therapeutic potential against SARS-CoV-2. Initially, several plant-based resources were exploited to screen around one thousand phytocompounds and further their physiochemical characterization and assessment of drug likeliness were performed using SwissADME. Eventually, we screened 95 compounds based on docking analysis using AutoDock Vina. Five compounds were selected having the highest affinity for Mpro for the analysis of ligand-receptor interaction using molecular dynamic (MD) simulation. Docking and MD simulation studies elucidated the promising stable interaction of selected 5 ligands with Mpro. During MD simulation of 100 ns, Abacopterin F showed the lowest binding energy (–37.13 kcal/mol) with the highest affinity towards Mpro and this compound may be proposed as a lead molecule for further investigation. This interaction may result in modulation of the Mpro activity, consequently leading to hindrance in viral particle formation. However, in-vitro and in-vivo experimental validation would be needed to process the selected phytomolecules as a therapeutic lead against SARS-CoV-2.

Fragment-Based Screen of SARS-CoV-2 Papain-like Protease (PLpro).

Coronaviruses have been responsible for numerous viral outbreaks in the past two decades due to the high transmission rate of this family of viruses. The deadliest outbreak is the recent Covid-19 pandemic, which resulted in over 7 million deaths worldwide. SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease (PLPro) plays a key role in both viral replication and host immune suppression and is highly conserved across the coronavirus family, making it an ideal drug target. Herein we describe a fragment-based screen against PLPro using protein-observed NMR experiments, identifying 77 hit fragments. Analyses of NMR perturbation patterns and X-ray cocrystallized structures reveal fragments bind to two distinct regions of the protein. Importantly none of the fragments identified belong to the same chemical class as the few reported inhibitors, allowing for the discovery of a novel class of PLPro inhibitors.

Addition of lime juice and NaCl to minced seafood may stimulate the expression of Listeria monocytogenes virulence, adhesion, and stress response genes.

Listeria monocytogenes is a ubiquitous opportunistic bacterium responsible for deadly listeriosis outbreaks. This pathogen has been recognized as a significant food-borne pathogen in seafood products. The present study aimed to investigate the transcript levels of virulence, adhesion, and stress response genes of L. monocytogenes upon exposure to sublethal levels of lime juice and NaCl in shrimp matrix. For this purpose, minced and broth shrimp samples (control, 2% NaCl, 5% NaCl, 25 μL/mL lime, and 50 μL/mL lime, as well as 2% NaCl+25 μL/mL lime) were inoculated with approximately 107 CFU/g or ml of L. monocytogenes, and subsequently, the samples were stored at 12°C or 37°C. For the minced samples, the transcription of one stress-related (sigB), two adhesion (imo1634 and imo1847), and four virulence (hly, prf, intA, and plc) genes was assessed by RT-qPCR after different storage times (0 and 48 h). Results showed that the transcript levels of sigB, imo1847, and imo1634 genes increased with increasing storage temperatures of shrimp broth (12°C to 37°C). At the beginning, the transcription of the studied genes decreased in all treatments of minced shrimp; however, after 48 h of storage at 12°C, the transcript levels of hly, prf, imo1847, imo1634, and intA genes were significantly upregulated up to 0.5-9 log2 fold-change in all treatments compared to the control group (p < .05). These results highlight that the survived L. monocytogenes after exposure to moderate salt content or lime juice could represent enhanced virulence and adhesion capabilities, posing a significant public health risk.

Association of Inflammatory Markers With Disease Progression and the Severity of COVID-19.

Introduction InDecember 2019, there was a massive outbreak of viral pneumonia, which had a high case fatality rate. Genetic sequencing of the virus showed similarity with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV). It was later named novel coronavirus 2019 while the disease it caused was given the nomenclature of COVID-19. This deadly pneumonia outbreak was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO). Aim To derive the strength of the correlation between blood levels of various inflammatory markers with the severity of COVID-19 pneumonia in patients affected with novel coronavirus 2019. Materials and methodology A prospective study was conducted on 300 confirmed cases of COVID-19 infection from August 2020 to July 2021 in SSG Hospital, Vadodara. Diagnosis of patients as confirmed cases of COVID-19 infection was done according to the WHO interim guidance for COVID-19. Their inflammatory markers were done for this study. All COVID-19-positive patients who had given negative consent for enrollment were excluded from the study. Patients were classified based on the severity of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Comprehensive medical record information, encompassing biodata, clinical symptoms, comorbidities, and laboratory investigations, was systematically collected. Patients were given the standard treatment protocol as per guidelines. Patients were subjected to detailed investigations comprising complete blood counts and inflammatory markers like C-reactive protein (CRP), lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), serum ferritin, and D-dimer. Patients were further investigated by chest X-ray (posteroanterior view) or high-resolution computed tomography of the thorax. Results A total of 300 confirmed cases of COVID-19 infection were included in this study. Most of them were males (52%) with a mean age of 51 years and 48% were females with a mean age of 55 years. The majority of patients(40%) did not have ARDS, 23.3% of patients had mild, 16.7% of patients had moderate, and 20% of patients had severe ARDS. Higher CRP levels, serum ferritin, and serum D-dimer were significantly associated with the severity of COVID-19 infection as compared to those having no symptoms (p < 0.05). Increased levels were associated with severe clinical manifestations of COVID-19. The sensitivity of CRP is 69% and specificity is 100% as a diagnostic marker for COVID-19 pneumonia in terms of ARDS. The sensitivity of ferritin is 88% and specificity is 81% as a diagnostic marker for COVID-19 pneumonia in terms of ARDS. The sensitivity of D-dimer is 94% and specificity is 89% as a diagnostic marker for COVID-19 pneumonia in terms of ARDS. The sensitivity of LDH is 93% and specificity is 84% as a diagnostic marker for COVID-19 pneumonia in terms of ARDS. Conclusions Current evidence from our study showed that higher levels of inflammatory markers such as CRP, LDH, D-dimer, and ferritin are associated with the severity of COVID-19 in terms of ARDS and thus could be used as significant prognostic factors of the disease.These indicators might support clinical decisions to identify highfatality casesand poor diagnosis in the initial admission phase.

THE MUCORMYCOSIS CRISIS: AN EPIDEMIC WITHIN A PANDEMIC

With the second wave of COVID-19 in the April of 2021, the deadly mucormycosis outbreak surfaced in South Asia. Mucormycosis infection is an uncommon yet perilous angio-invasive fungal infection with a fatality rate of 54% globally. Immunocompromised COVID-19 patients with underlying comorbidities like diabetes mellitus and who were on prolonged steroid medications were the most vulnerable to develop this infection. Regionally, a highly disproportionate increase in COVID-19 associated mucormycosis (CAM) was observed. While there has been vigorous attention on the pathological risk factors, little attention has been paid to the environmental factors specific to different regions which may explain the grotesque increase in CAM cases in some regions while ordinary increase in the other. Recognizing the interplay between the two factors will aid epidemiologists in understanding the spread of the disease and help prevent future epidemics. This review analyzes the current literature on CAM to update clinicians on circumstances that lead to outbreak. Keywords: Covid-19 Associated Mucormycosis, Mucormycosis, South Asia.

The Paradox of Punishment: Between Assimilation and Indonesian Public Health During the Covid-19 Pandemic

Since the beginning of 2020, Indonesia has been hit by a deadly virus outbreak known as Corona Virus Disease or Covid-19. Covid-19, which is claimed to be a pandemic, has changed the foundations of all sectors of life, including the legal and criminal system in Indonesia. Various gaps have been created between das sein and das sollen related to the regulations issued by the government to reduce the number of Covid-19 cases. On the one hand, the Ministry of Law and Human Rights in its mandate has established a policy of releasing prisoners through the assimilation and integration rights program as one of the steps to suppress the spread of Covid-19. Contrary to this, on the other hand, a regulation has emerged that threatens the public for those who violate the rules regarding the prevention of this epidemic, especially for violators of Law Number 6 of 2018 concerning Quarantine. These two law enforcement policies will certainly be a punishment paradox where if prisoners are given assimilation, it will have the potential to cause a Covid-19 cluster from prisons to the general public and also has the potential to cause other problems such as committing crimes again. Likewise, if a prokes violator is put in prison, it is possible that he will contract Covid-19 and spread it to prisoners in prison, so this will become very vulnerable considering that the number of prisoners in prison is very large and even over capacity.

The Plague in Madras: The Making of an “Immune” City

In 1912, the Lancet published an article titled “The City of Madras and its immunity from epidemic plague.” The Lancet’s article was part of a spate of investigations by sanitary officials, bacteriologists, and epidemiologists into the reasons as to why the city remained largely free from the plague pandemic, which hit colonial India especially hard in the latter half of the 1890s. The absent epidemic in Madras suggests new ways to understand plague in colonial India and the relationship between the etiology of epidemics and cities more broadly. Colonial officials assumed that the plague would affect Madras in a similar fashion to the deadly outbreaks in Bombay and Hong Kong. The article follows varied explanations for the absence of the plague, showing how tropical environments were hardly inherently vulnerable to disease. Rather, the disease was constituted in specific urban environments, which had implications on understanding of disease vulnerability and immunity.

The Alarming Resurgence of Dengue Fever with Unusual Clinical Manifestations and Deadly Consequences of 2023 Outbreak in Bangladesh

Background: Dengue fever has become a significant concern in Bangladesh in recent years. The country is currently experiencing the most significant and deadliest outbreak in 2023. In this article, we will delve into the current dengue situation in Bangladesh, analyzing its clinical profile and grave consequences. Materials and methods: This multicentric cross-sectional study analyzed 499 confirmed dengue patients admitted between May 1, 2023, and September 30, 2023, in the Department of Medicine, Popular Medical College and Hospital, and Sir Salimullah Medical College and Mitford Hospital, Dhaka. Patients were categorized into dengue Groups A, B, and C. We tabulated and expressed categorical variables (gender, clinical manifestations, comorbidity, radiological and laboratory findings) as frequencies and percentages and explored relationships between demographics, clinical manifestations, and severity. The chisquare test compared proportions, with p d” 0.05 considered significant. Duration of illness and hospital stay were analyzed using the Mann-Whitney U test. Results: Among 499 patients, the 21-40 age group with a male predominance was most affected. Predominant symptoms were fever and gastrointestinal issues. Bleeding, myalgia, and rash were less common. Group C displayed a shift towards Dengue Shock Syndrome (DSS) rather than Dengue Hemorrhagic Fever (DHF), with 125 patients experiencing shock. Group B exhibited significant ultrasonographic findings, such as ascites, hepatomegaly, and splenomegaly, while Group C had more pronounced radiological findings of pleural effusion and pneumonia, predominantly unilateral right-sided pleural effusion. In both Groups B and C, liver transaminases, serum ferritin, and serum lipase were consistently elevated. Tragically, 9 (1.80%) patients, all in Group C, did not survive. Conclusions: In summary, our study on the current dengue outbreak in Bangladesh indicates a worrying shift to severe Dengue Shock Syndrome, more prevalent than hemorrhagic fever. Prominent gastrointestinal symptoms, less bleeding, and higher mortality in Group C emphasize the crisis. J Bangladesh Coll Phys Surg 2023; 41: 12-20

COVID-19 Vaccination-Associated Spontaneous Heparin-Induced Thrombocytopenia Syndrome

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has emerged as the deadliest outbreak in recent American history, surpassing the estimated U.S. fatalities from the 1918 influenza pandemic. Since its identification in December 2019 in Wuhan, China, COVID-19 has contributed to the death of nearly six million people worldwide. The United States (U.S.) Food and Drug Administration (FDA) initially issued emergency use authorization for three vaccines for prevention of COVID-19, and currently two have received full FDA approval. Herein, we report a case of severe thrombocytopenia in a man following heterologous booster vaccination with the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine with concomitant presence of a heparin-P4 antibody but without proximate heparin exposure. The degree of thrombocytopenia was severe, but the patient had a natural recovery of platelet count over the next 2 weeks without need for any immunomodulatory therapies. This is the first case report of COVID vaccine-associated heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT)-like platelet disorder without proximate heparin exposure, also called spontaneous HIT syndrome. Keywords: Thrombocytopenia, Cor

Marburg virus: a potential outbreak on the horizon?

Marburg virus: a potential outbreak on the horizon?

Strategies to Operationalize Health Equity in Island Area Health Departments.

Strategies to Operationalize Health Equity in Island Area Health Departments.

Persediaan Menghadapi Pandemik Berikutnya: Penyelesaian Menurut Islam

Pandemic management is a challengingmatter for all parties. Severe uncertainty prevailed regarding adaptation to the epidemic, leaving more lives unsalvageable. Health organizations continue to move to obtain and communicate information about the pandemic to all corners of the world, especially to at-risk populations. However, literacy related to pandemic information from Islamic literature is still limited. This study is qualitative, by analyzing the literature to find out the Islamic approach in facing the pandemic. Our study generalizes Islamic strategies in dealing with deadly disease outbreaks before, during, and after the outbreak. This study found that the Islamic strategy in dealing with deadly disease outbreaks is to stay away from immoral acts, a solid spiritual preparation. In addition, strict SOP enforcement actions to the community during the pandemic to ensure the spread of the epidemic can be controlled. Islam offers a combined approach of spiritual, physical, emotional, and intellectual care in the face of deadly disease pandemics. We suggest epidemic-related guidelines in a holistic form for future research.

Microbes of Empire

Microbes of Empire Priscilla Wald (bio) Click for larger view View full resolution Anti-Asian hate crimes rose dramatically during the pandemic. This poster appeared in the New York subway in February 2021. Credit: STAR MAX file photo via AP. [End Page 706] In memory of Amy Kaplan We are living in a moment in which the natural world and the social world are manifesting dramatic chaos, beset with reminders of the precarity of human existence in the form of pandemics, climate catastrophes, and seemingly endless examples of structural racism. In the ancient world, plague spoke in the language of the gods: it was the natural—which is to say divine—world's way of manifesting a rupture in the social order. The ancients' understanding of the connection between these worlds has been severed over time, but perhaps the contemporary moment can return us to that sacred insight. Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the world has witnessed a proliferation of devastating climate disasters in the form of record-setting temperatures, especially heat waves, and accompanying droughts, fires, hurricanes, cyclones, tornados, monsoons, and landslides. Glaciers are melting, and air and water are becoming increasingly unhealthy to breathe or drink. Social tensions are escalating worldwide. The pandemic is at once a symptom and an accelerant, putting on display the inequities in the United States and abroad that find expression in discrepancies in morbidity and mortality rates from COVID-19 and other health disparities and from state violence at "home" and abroad, the embodiment of the racism of US imperialism that Amy Kaplan documents in The Anarchy of Empire in the Making of U.S. Culture. If, as Kaplan suggests, the incorporation of colonial (or postcolonial) territories and populations posed a threat to the ostensible coherence of the national (American) body politic, the conventional story that circulates in science, the media, and popular fiction and film about the bodily threat of microbes materializes the threat to American bodies.1 COVID-19 is certainly not the first, but it is the most recent and perhaps most widespread of what epidemiologists and other medical professionals have dubbed "emerging infections." In the 1980s, the identification of a catastrophic communicable disease that had similarly circled the globe—AIDS—drew the [End Page 707] attention of medical science and epidemiology to what appeared to be a new phenomenon: the emergence of catastrophic communicable diseases that humanity had not previously encountered. In 1989, the epidemiologist Stephen S. Morse organized a meeting of medical professionals to discuss what they labeled "Emerging Viruses: The Evolution of Viruses and Viral Diseases." The eradication of naturally occurring smallpox and other dramatic developments in the identification and treatment of communicable diseases in the 1960s and 1970s had imparted an air of sanguinity to the medical community. The increasing control over communicable disease was hailed as an emblem of progress: human conquest over nature. AIDS and other emerging infections challenged that story. In the analysis that surfaced at the 1989 conference, the new viruses emerged as evidence of the unforeseen and disastrous consequences of that progress: the technological and other advances that contributed to increasing globalization and development practices, including improved transportation that moved people and goods more rapidly around the globe and the settlement of a growing population in previously sparsely inhabited or uninhabited areas around the world. Emerging infections, that is, were material expressions of the dangerous expansiveness and uncontrolled forces of what Kaplan—following W. E. B. Du Bois—called the "anarchy of empire." The message of the conference was clear: the world could not rely on scientific medicine alone to contain this new threat; humans had to change the way we inhabit the planet. As Morse explained in a postconference publication, the deadly outbreaks were the result of "ecological or demographic changes including deforestation, dam building, changes in agricultural products or in land use, and major demographic changes such as population migrations," and humans were the "major engineers of biological traffic."2 The biologist Rachel Carson had issued an analogous warning in her chilling 1962 account of how the "fanatic zeal" to dominate the nonhuman world—"the crusade to create a chemically sterile, insect-free world"—had turned...

Assessment of COVID-19 pandemic healthcare infrastructure of Mizoram, India

The deadly COVID-19 outbreak emerged in the city of Wuhan, China at the end of 2019 and developed into a global pandemic during March 2020. According to Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt. of India report of 2021, recovery rate of the state capital of Mizoram is very low while the positivity rate is high during the second wave compared to the national average. Therefore this present study aimed to analyze the spatial pattern of Covid Care Centers, infrastructural details and different Covid Care Service area with the help of GIS using Nearest Neighbour Analysis (NNA) and Weighted Linear Combined Model (WLCM) in Aizawl district of Mizoram. The result shows that Covid Care Centers are mainly clustered in city areas and infrastructure is not adequate. There is dearth of COVID care facilities in the district and the major chunk of facilities are located only in the capital city of Aizawl leaving the rest of the district in a weak zone facility wise. Only city and its surrounding areas have very high and high Covid Care Service. The overall scenario is indicating a poor condition towards the village areas.

Semantic Pattern Detection in Covid-19 using Contextual Clustering and Intelligent Topic Modeling

The Covid-19 pandemic is the deadliest outbreak in our living memory. So, it is need of hour, to prepare the world with strategies to prevent and control the impact of the epidemics. In this paper, a novel semantic pattern detection approach in the Covid-19 literature using contextual clustering and intelligent topic modeling is presented. For contextual clustering, three level weights at term level, document level, and corpus level are used with latent semantic analysis. For intelligent topic modeling, semantic collocations using pointwise mutual information(PMI) and log frequency biased mutual dependency(LBMD) are selected and latent dirichlet allocation is applied. Contextual clustering with latent semantic analysis presents semantic spaces with high correlation in terms at corpus level. Through intelligent topic modeling, topics are improved in the form of lower perplexity and highly coherent. This research helps in finding the knowledge gap in the area of Covid-19 research and offered direction for future research.

Is fractional-order chaos theory the new tool to model chaotic pandemics as Covid-19?

The deadly outbreak of the second wave of Covid-19, especially in worst hit lower-middle-income countries like India, and the drastic rise of another growing epidemic of Mucormycosis, call for an efficient mathematical tool to model pandemics, analyse their course of outbreak and help in adopting quicker control strategies to converge to an infection-free equilibrium. This review paper on prominent pandemics reveals that their dispersion is chaotic in nature having long-range memory effects and features which the existing integer-order models fail to capture. This paper thus puts forward the use of fractional-order (FO) chaos theory that has memory capacity and hereditary properties, as a potential tool to model the pandemics with more accuracy and closeness to their real physical dynamics. We investigate eight FO models of Bombay plague, Cancer and Covid-19 pandemics through phase portraits, time series, Lyapunov exponents and bifurcation analysis. FO controllers (FOCs) on the concepts of fuzzy logic, adaptive sliding mode and active backstepping control are designed to stabilise chaos. Also, FOCs based on adaptive sliding mode and active backstepping synchronisation are designed to synchronise a chaotic epidemic with a non-chaotic one, to mitigate the unpredictability due to chaos during transmission. It is found that severity and complexity of the models increase as the memory fades, indicating that FO can be used as a crucial parameter to analyse the progression of a pandemic. To sum it up, this paper will help researchers to have an overview of using fractional calculus in modelling pandemics more precisely and also to approximate, choose, stabilise and synchronise the chaos control parameter that will eliminate the extreme sensitivity and irregularity of the models.