Why I (sometimes) capitalize Pandemic

The publications I tend to look to for guidance on writing style—the New Yorker, for example, and the New York Times—are not capitalizing “pandemic” even when referring to the Pandemic that appears to have begun in Wuhan in late 2019. I don’t agree with their choice here. Names of specific historical events are usually capitalized. While you wouldn’t capitalize “civil war,” for example, when you’re writing about civil wars in general, you’d definitely capitalize “Civil War” when you’re referring to the one that took place in the United States between 1861 and 1865. The recent Pandemic may not have receded completely, but it’s definitely a major historical event, and I’m therefore mystified that it’s not being given the same typographical treatment as other major historical events.