Introduction: capturing the beginning of a long journey of loss, trauma and grief

In December 2019, a new virus by the name Covid-19 emerged in Wuhan, China, which quickly spread across the world and by March 2020 was declared a global pandemic by the World Health Organization. Since then, the pandemic has transformed human experience on so many different levels, including social, financial, political and spiritual. Specifically, Covid-19 quickly became associated with trauma and loss, while death was forced into people’s home as part of everyday conversation. The introduction of this book simply sets the scene and identifies the context of the pandemic in which the subsequent chapters lay arguments regarding death, grief and loss.