Citation

Ahmed QA, Memish ZA. Travel Med. Infect. Dis. 2019; 28: 91-97.

Affiliation

Infectious Diseases Division, Department of Medicine and Research Department, Prince Mohammed Bin Abdulaziz Hospital, Ministry of Health & College of Medicine Alfaisal University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Hubert Department of Global Health, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, Atlanta, USA. Electronic address: Zmemish@yahoo.com.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.tmaid.2018.06.001

PMID

29879514

Abstract

Human behavior has long engaged in collective behavior assembling in crowds. The Christian pilgrimage to the Holy Land which has been recorded since the 4th century while the Hajj, Islam's great pilgrimage, has existed for fourteen centuries of which a body of literature devoted to the travelogues of the Hajj has existed for over ten centuries. Football, a sport played worldwide by more than 1.5 million teams and in 300,000 clubs. Most people however play outside of the officially organized sphere. More than 4 percent of the global population plays football, including 270 million amateur players. Assembling for specific events is a uniquely human behavior though the formal study of crowds would not begin until the mid-Twentieth Century. Today mass gathering focuses on the public health challenges to hosting events attended by a large enough number of people at a specific site for a defined period of time to strain the planning and response of a community, state, or nation. All of us can recall attending a mass gathering whether it be watching one's favorite rock group in performance or assembling for religious pilgrimage. Certainly, the event itself is transporting and transforming and the unison of behaviors and activities can be enormously enriching uplifting and overwhelming just as they may be at times dangerous and high risk. This review seeks to draw contrasts and comparisons between sporting gatherings and religious gatherings with a chief focus on Hajj, among the largest of all mass gatherings today. We will find there are some powerful similarities as there as stark differences. Each bequeaths a legacy which can inform the other and as we make our observations we join with you and the legions of other investigators who continue to remain fascinated and enthralled by the mass gatherings which are among the most beloved and beholden events of modern humanity.

Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Language: en

Keywords

Hajj; Mass gatherings; Olympic; Religious; Sports