Wikipedia:Top 25 Report/March 15 to 21, 2020

Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (March 15 to 21, 2020)
Prepared with commentary by  and 

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This week's top 25 is almost dominated by articles about diseases--almost certainly an effect of the ongoing pandemic. However, there were some Top 25ers that had nothing to do with the virus--the article for country singer Kenny Rogers and the article for the 2012 Delhi gang rape are two of them.


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! Rank ! Article ! Class ! Views ! Image ! Notes/about In this event, a physiotherapy intern in her 20s was beaten, gang-raped and tortured in a bus travelling in a South Delhi neighbourhood. An attempt at emergency treatment proved fruitless; the intern died just short of two weeks after the raping. In the aftermath of the assault, protests erupted across India, calling for better security for women. Six people were convicted as perpetrators of the incident; four of them were given a death sentence, one was imprisoned for three years and another died in police custody. The four convicted with a death sentence were executed on the 20th March this year. Andrew Cuomo is the 56th and current Governor of New York. A Democrat, Cuomo is a graduate of Fordham University and Union University. His time as the Governor of New York has overseen things such as the legalisation of same-sex marriage, the introduction of paid family leave, a rise in the minimum wage and the legalisation of medical marijuana in the state. The Governor's response to the outbreak in New York state includes a declaration of a State of Emergency and apparently daily briefings on COVID-19. Sweet!
 * 1
 * 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic
 * 7,645,103
 * SARS-CoV-2 without background.png
 * Early 2020 bears the burden of a multinational pandemic caused by the Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. The page for the pandemic in particular is receiving so many views that WMFLabs' |2019%E2%80%9320_coronavirus_outbreak ever-useful Pageviews Analysis tool shows that all through this month there was never a day below 400k visitors... oh dear.
 * 2
 * Coronavirus
 * 2,749,576
 * Coronaviruses 004 lores.jpg
 * The term 'Coronavirus' refers to a class of viruses which tend to affect mammals and birds. The Coronavirus family ranges from near-harmless common cold causers, to the one you see in the news--Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2--to the hulking (not literally), spree-slaying Middle East respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus, which, in its 2012 outbreak, presented victims with a ~35% chance of dying. The Coronaviruses are so named because of their peculiar spikes, called peplomers, which create an illusion of a stellar corona when viewed under an electron microscope.
 * 3
 * Spanish flu
 * 2,648,537
 * USCampHospital45InfluenzaWard.jpg
 * The Spanish flu was a flu pandemic that occurred from 1918 to 1920. One of the deadliest epidemics in recorded human history, the Spanish flu took place during a time when information was possibly being censored because of the war effort at the time. As for afterward, I don't know. All this censoring (which, by the way, was meant to keep morale up) left neutral country Spain as basically the only hard-hit country that took pains to accurately report infections--and so the pandemic was named after Spain (because countries thought Spain was the epicentre of the outbreak).
 * 4
 * Coronavirus disease 2019
 * 2,455,634
 * Symptoms of coronavirus disease 2019 2.0.svg
 * The illness caused by the Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2.
 * 5
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in Italy
 * 2,087,780
 * rowspan=3|SARS-CoV-2 without background.png
 * rowspan=3|Attention drawn by the COVID-19 pandemic is also concentrated on specific countries (as well as the general pandemic). Italy, considering deaths from infections, is the hardest-hit country in the world; doctors there are having to choose who lives, who dies, who tells their story . It's that hard. India's high standing here is probably due to its massive English-speaking population base. Same for the United States; in addition, the US currently has the very unfortunate position as the fastest-growing country in the world in terms of new infections.
 * 6
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in India
 * 1,923,144
 * 7
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in the United States
 * 1,752,639
 * 8
 * Kenny Rogers
 * 1,497,434
 * KennyRogers.jpg
 * Kenny Rogers is one of the best-selling musicians of all time, with a cool 100 million records sold during his lifetime; he was welcomed into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2013. The Texan's 60-year career was punctuated with hits such as The Gambler and his cover of Islands in the Stream. Rogers passed away of natural causes at his home on the 20th of March this year.
 * 9
 * 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic by country and territory
 * 1,450,648
 * COVID-19 Outbreak World Map per Capita.svg
 * Another COVID-19 article; this time, dealing with the actual impact of the pandemic. Take a look at the map to the left--red all around. It's not looking good...
 * 10
 * 2009 flu pandemic
 * 1,261,204
 * H1N1 navbox.jpg
 * This pandemic was caused by the same type of influenza that caused the Spanish Flu (H1N1; swine flu). Estimates of total infections from this pandemic range to 1.4 billion (see the infobox in that article). That's huge!
 * 11
 * Contagion (2011 film)
 * 1,114,828
 * WHMIS_Class_D-3.svg
 * The 2011 action thriller movie Contagion is about, unsurprisingly, diseases. The film was directed by Steven Soderbergh and stars Marion Cotillard, Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kate Winslet. It achieved around $130 million at the box office against a budget of $60 million. Rotten Tomatoes gives the film 85%. And recently, lots of people have been watching for reality resonance.
 * 12
 * Martial law
 * 1,114,532
 * DunmoresProclamation.jpg
 * Martial law is when a region's law is directly enforced by military forces. This can be employed when the public are getting really, really restless (which they might do during a coup d'etat or a revolution or an intense protest). To be frank, martial law may also be exploited for personal use--not to intentionally single people out, I'm sorry if this causes offence--for example, the time of martial law in the Philippines under former President Ferdinand Marcos has been claimed as being characterised by things such as human rights abuses.
 * 13
 * Black Death
 * 1,048,746
 * 1346-1353 spread of the Black Death in Europe map.svg
 * Coming back to pandemics--the Black Death was a pandemic that killed anywhere from 75 to 200 million (!) people across Eurasia in the 1300s. This pandemic was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, which is passed on to humans by the Oriental rat flea. Remnants of the Black Death continued until the 1900s.
 * 14
 * 2012 Delhi gang rape
 * 944,098
 * Delhi protests-students, Raisina Hill.jpg
 * In the words of one of my Indian friends: 'This was a big deal.'
 * 11
 * Contagion (2011 film)
 * 1,114,828
 * WHMIS_Class_D-3.svg
 * The 2011 action thriller movie Contagion is about, unsurprisingly, diseases. The film was directed by Steven Soderbergh and stars Marion Cotillard, Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kate Winslet. It achieved around $130 million at the box office against a budget of $60 million. Rotten Tomatoes gives the film 85%. And recently, lots of people have been watching for reality resonance.
 * 12
 * Martial law
 * 1,114,532
 * DunmoresProclamation.jpg
 * Martial law is when a region's law is directly enforced by military forces. This can be employed when the public are getting really, really restless (which they might do during a coup d'etat or a revolution or an intense protest). To be frank, martial law may also be exploited for personal use--not to intentionally single people out, I'm sorry if this causes offence--for example, the time of martial law in the Philippines under former President Ferdinand Marcos has been claimed as being characterised by things such as human rights abuses.
 * 13
 * Black Death
 * 1,048,746
 * 1346-1353 spread of the Black Death in Europe map.svg
 * Coming back to pandemics--the Black Death was a pandemic that killed anywhere from 75 to 200 million (!) people across Eurasia in the 1300s. This pandemic was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, which is passed on to humans by the Oriental rat flea. Remnants of the Black Death continued until the 1900s.
 * 14
 * 2012 Delhi gang rape
 * 944,098
 * Delhi protests-students, Raisina Hill.jpg
 * In the words of one of my Indian friends: 'This was a big deal.'
 * Coming back to pandemics--the Black Death was a pandemic that killed anywhere from 75 to 200 million (!) people across Eurasia in the 1300s. This pandemic was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, which is passed on to humans by the Oriental rat flea. Remnants of the Black Death continued until the 1900s.
 * 14
 * 2012 Delhi gang rape
 * 944,098
 * Delhi protests-students, Raisina Hill.jpg
 * In the words of one of my Indian friends: 'This was a big deal.'
 * Delhi protests-students, Raisina Hill.jpg
 * In the words of one of my Indian friends: 'This was a big deal.'
 * 15
 * Zhong Nanshan
 * 940,921
 * Zhong Nanshan (cropped).jpg
 * Zhong Nanshan is credited with discovering the original Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (not the virus causing the current pandemic). The original SARS coronavirus caused an outbreak in 2002-04 that infected over 8,000 across 17 countries--numbers that are big by themselves but now seem tiny compared to the current pandemic.
 * 16
 * Deaths in 2020
 * 865,101
 * CathedralOfTrier Skeleton.JPG
 * Take a single look at this particular list and you'll realise the true scale of the rate in which we lose people--not a particularly happy note. For me, my year started with a jolt when I read the first news reports of the death of Kobe Bryant. What about you? Humanity has always been concerned about death; the permanent disappearance of a life, a personality, a soul. Some of us grieve; some of us have fun (this fun coming in the form of Day of the Dead). But no matter how we react to the deed of the Grim Reaper, death is certainly an interesting subject. Take a look at Wikipedia's very own list of unusual deaths! Not to poke fun at when people breathe their last breath, but this list covers everyone from people who died from falling poodles to a King of Sweden who literally ate himself to death. I'm sorry, this is a huge tangent I've gone on.
 * 17
 * Pandemic
 * 855,980
 * 1918FluVictimsStLouis.jpg
 * A pandemic is essentially when a disease outbreak has global reach, or a reach across a lot of land in relation to the Earth's total land area. There have and are pandemics involving Cholera, Typhus, Smallpox, Measles, Tuberculosis, Leprosy, Malaria, Yellow Fever, HIV/AIDS, Influenza, and of course, COVID-19. Pictured on the left are victims of the Spanish flu.
 * 18
 * Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act
 * 854,377
 * Great Seal of the United States (obverse).svg
 * The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, formally titled 'An Act to amend the Disaster Relief Act of 1974 to provide for more effective assistance in response to major disasters and emergencies, and for other purposes', is a United States federal law that helps state and local governments lend a hand to their citizens, should there be a destructive natural disaster (such as a hurricane).
 * 19
 * Madam C. J. Walker
 * 829,540
 * Madam CJ Walker face circa 1914.jpg
 * Born Sarah Breedlove, Walker was notable for being the first well-documented, self-made, female millionaire in the United States. She made her fortune from cosmetics and hair care products, exclusive to African-American women, and her net worth clocked in at around 8 million (I'm not sure if this is adjusted for inflation or not). And her life is now documented on the Netflix production Self Made, starring Octavia Spencer.
 * 20
 * Andrew Cuomo
 * 805,167
 * Andrew Cuomo by Pat Arnow cropped.jpeg
 * "You're not Superman, and you're not Superwoman." [regarding the COVID-19 pandemic]
 * Madam C. J. Walker
 * 829,540
 * Madam CJ Walker face circa 1914.jpg
 * Born Sarah Breedlove, Walker was notable for being the first well-documented, self-made, female millionaire in the United States. She made her fortune from cosmetics and hair care products, exclusive to African-American women, and her net worth clocked in at around 8 million (I'm not sure if this is adjusted for inflation or not). And her life is now documented on the Netflix production Self Made, starring Octavia Spencer.
 * 20
 * Andrew Cuomo
 * 805,167
 * Andrew Cuomo by Pat Arnow cropped.jpeg
 * "You're not Superman, and you're not Superwoman." [regarding the COVID-19 pandemic]
 * 805,167
 * Andrew Cuomo by Pat Arnow cropped.jpeg
 * "You're not Superman, and you're not Superwoman." [regarding the COVID-19 pandemic]
 * 21
 * The Eyes of Darkness
 * 785,987
 * Wuhan Yangtze River Bridge-1.jpg
 * The Eyes of Darkness is a 1981 thriller novel by Dean Koontz, about a mother who is not satisfied with current knowledge and sets out to prove to herself whether her son is dead or not. The Eyes has recently picked up popularity due to a mention of a bioweapon named 'Wuhan-400'. Originally called 'Gorki-400' after the Russian city of Gorki Leninskiye, the weapon was renamed to Wuhan because of the collapse of the Soviet Union. The coronavirus causing the current pandemic, by current knowledge, originated from Wuhan. Did Koontz somehow predict the emergence of this particular harrowing coronavirus? I'll never know. Hey, perhaps that's why he decided to write under a pen name... hmm
 * 22
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in Germany
 * 770,246
 * SARS-CoV-2 without background.png
 * The first case of COVID-19 in Germany was confirmed on the 27th January this year, in the southern state of Bavaria. If you're not an expert in southern German states, here's a fun fact--the football club FC Bayern München is based in the capital of Bavaria, Munich (FC Bayern's name literally means 'FC Bavaria Munich'). Ever since that first infection, the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus has infected more than 20,000 people in Germany; the situation there even caused chancellor Angela Merkel to go into quarantine as Merkel had come into contact with an infected physician.
 * 23
 * Anthony S. Fauci / Anthony Fauci
 * 742,354
 * Anthony S. Fauci, M.D., NIAID Director (26759498706).jpg
 * Anthony Stephen Fauci, hailing from Brooklyn, New York, is the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force. Assuming directorial office in 1984, Fauci has served under six (!) presidents and has come up with therapies for blood vessel disorders (see Polyarteritis nodosa, Granulomatosis with polyangiitis and Lymphomatoid granulomatosis) as well as insight into how the HIV virus destroys our immune defenses, among others.
 * 24
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in Spain
 * 715,262
 * SARS-CoV-2 without background.png
 * Spain's first infection originated from a German tourist in the Canary Islands. With the Italian outbreak growing fast, it soon became inevitable that Spain, a close country (sometimes less than 600 kilometres/375 miles apart) would feel some effect--and on the 24th February this year, it happened. That day saw multiple cases show up, these originating from an Italian doctor on holiday (also in the Canary Islands). At the time of writing, Spain had almost 30,000 cases.
 * 25
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in the United Kingdom
 * 677,019
 * Catch it, Bin it, Kill it poster.jpg
 * And lucky last (whew), another local article about the 2019-20 pandemic, this time concerning the UK. At the time of writing, infection statistics for the UK were looking worryingly similar to that of an exponential curve. To see what I mean, check out the green curve in the top image in the article for exponential curves. When initially confronted with COVID-19 positives in the UK, Prime Minister Boris Johnson chose to approach the issue with a Herd Immunity strategy--see the article for more details. I'm not sure of what the UK is doing now; however, what I do know is that there's a cool awareness slogan being spread around called 'Catch it, Bin it, Kill it'. I've put a picture of it on the left. The UK's first infections originated from China; there are now around five and a half thousand cases.
 * }
 * SARS-CoV-2 without background.png
 * Spain's first infection originated from a German tourist in the Canary Islands. With the Italian outbreak growing fast, it soon became inevitable that Spain, a close country (sometimes less than 600 kilometres/375 miles apart) would feel some effect--and on the 24th February this year, it happened. That day saw multiple cases show up, these originating from an Italian doctor on holiday (also in the Canary Islands). At the time of writing, Spain had almost 30,000 cases.
 * 25
 * 2020 coronavirus pandemic in the United Kingdom
 * 677,019
 * Catch it, Bin it, Kill it poster.jpg
 * And lucky last (whew), another local article about the 2019-20 pandemic, this time concerning the UK. At the time of writing, infection statistics for the UK were looking worryingly similar to that of an exponential curve. To see what I mean, check out the green curve in the top image in the article for exponential curves. When initially confronted with COVID-19 positives in the UK, Prime Minister Boris Johnson chose to approach the issue with a Herd Immunity strategy--see the article for more details. I'm not sure of what the UK is doing now; however, what I do know is that there's a cool awareness slogan being spread around called 'Catch it, Bin it, Kill it'. I've put a picture of it on the left. The UK's first infections originated from China; there are now around five and a half thousand cases.
 * }
 * And lucky last (whew), another local article about the 2019-20 pandemic, this time concerning the UK. At the time of writing, infection statistics for the UK were looking worryingly similar to that of an exponential curve. To see what I mean, check out the green curve in the top image in the article for exponential curves. When initially confronted with COVID-19 positives in the UK, Prime Minister Boris Johnson chose to approach the issue with a Herd Immunity strategy--see the article for more details. I'm not sure of what the UK is doing now; however, what I do know is that there's a cool awareness slogan being spread around called 'Catch it, Bin it, Kill it'. I've put a picture of it on the left. The UK's first infections originated from China; there are now around five and a half thousand cases.
 * }
 * }



Exclusions

 * This list excludes the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Since mobile view data became available to the Report in October 2014, we exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (5–6% or less) or almost all mobile views (94–95% or more) because they are very likely to be automated views based on our experience and research of the issue. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the talk page if you wish.