On The Occurrence of Historical Pandemics During The Grand Solar Minima

The occurrence of viral pandemics depends on several factors, including their stochasticity, and the prediction may not be possible. However, we show that the historical register of pandemics coincides with the epoch of the last seven grand solar minima of the Holocene era. We also included those more recent, and some pandemics incidence forecasts for the coming years, with the probable advent of a new Dalton-like solar minimum with onset in 2006. Taking into account that cosmic-rays and consequently the neutrons produced by them in the atmosphere are in an inverse relationship with the solar activity. We show the possibility of obtention the pandemics occurrence rates considering that they are due to mutations induced by the neutron capture upon the presence of hydrogen in the viral proteins, producing radical changes, an “antigenic-shift”, forming a new type of viral strains. Since the cross-section of neutron capture is small, the occurrence of an antigenic-shift requires a substantial increase in the flow of thermal neutrons, and this is more feasible during the epochs of the grand solar minima when the cosmic-rays fluence is highest. On the other hand, the rate of occurrence of most common viral outbreaks (epidemics) suggests a link with the scattering of neutrons and other secondary cosmic rays, causing small changes, an “antigenic-drift”. In addition to being influenced by seasonal conditions, we also show the solar modulation antigenic-drifts by the 11-year solar cycle. We present details of these observations.