The five stages of an apocalypse

An apocalypse is considered to be a world-changing event that ends life as we know it but doesn’t necessarily end life altogether. If the world’s governments and infrastructure collapse and everyone else stops doing their jobs followed by mass deaths then you have yourself an apocalypse. With people worrying about protecting their families and themselves from whatever it may be, they won’t be going to work and so the farms, hospitals, power, and running water will stop, and shops will be looted for supplies without the possibility of being re-stocked and everyone will realize they are on their own in a lawless land. But what are the five stages of an apocalypse, how do these things start and how do they get worse?

Stage 1 – The announcement

When the governments realize they can no longer keep secret the cause of a mass societal disturbance, or someone lets it slip before they do, everyone will start to panic but life will go on reasonably normally. There’s always a new disease around the corner or some kind of asteroid that “could” hit the earth, but initially, apart from some panic buying and a few checkpoints here and there, everything will remain close to normal.

Stage 2 – Shortages and closures

When things get worse people will stop going to work, and with the recent Coronavirus outbreak as an example, only essential services like food and transport will continue as normal. This is the point where the people who don’t normally panic buy will start to do so and everyone will realize there’s the possibility of not being able to get the things they need.

Stage 3 – Desperation

People working those essential jobs still have families of their own and even a doctor or police officer won’t do their regular shift if their family is in danger of having their home raided or the only way to get food is to queue for hours at a ration point. When this happens water and electricity will only be provided at certain times or in some kind of ration amount to each household. Transport will be restricted to emergency personnel only and people will start to do things to get food and medicine they wouldn’t normally dream of doing.

Stage 4 – Initial Breakdown

With no more food coming into the shops and the breakdown or initial lack of ration points, people will do anything to get supplies. In a large town or city, there won’t be close to enough crops in the area to feed even a fraction of everyone nearby, and so the only way to get things will be to take them from people who can’t stop you. With the emergency services stretched way beyond their capabilities the land will essentially be next to lawless and as soon as starving people realize this they’ll risk anything, and all without consequences from the police.

Stage 5 – Complete breakdown and mass deaths

When car crashes have blocked all the roads with no one to remove them, and the power and water supply has stopped there will be a huge wave of deaths which will probably be the majority of the population. Many countries on earth don’t grow enough food to feed themselves and rely on overseas supplies that would have stopped, so even if everyone worked together and all became farmers a large portion of that country’s population would still starve to death.

The days when the average person knew how to grow their own food and make everything for themselves have long since past, and most people wouldn’t be able to grow their own food even if you gave them everything to do it. The starvation combined with the murders and deaths from whatever caused the apocalypse would end civilization as we know it, and the survivors would be limited to small isolated settlements with enough land to grow food for their own people.