[Muromec]

One could argue that being shut off from in-person interaction is not as big of a challenge, as escaping a genocide or being drafted into an army to fight $ideology on the other side of the globe.

Pandemic is sure bad, but not "half of all men in your country being killed in war" bad.

[LocalH]

One could also argue that the reduction of in-person interaction is in some ways worse, if not as heinous, because of the long term harm that it will cause.

[evilduck]

Does something really have to be equal to or greater than WWII in damage to qualify as a bad year or two? That's quite a high bar to set.