A pandemic is an illness that impacts the entire world. In the context of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (that's the virus' name) that causes Covid 19 (the illness), it was a new disease that humans have never been exposed to before. This means that no one had developed immunity to the virus before being exposed. How individual immune systems have reacted has been hugely variable...from overwhelming sepsis and lung damage to minor illness with fever, cough and minor symptoms. Although elderly patients seem more likely to require hospitalization and die, that has not been a universal experience and there's no way for medical professionals right now to predict who is going to get critically ill and who will have minimal symptoms.
As an example, I know two doctors who have both contracted Covid19. Both are men at the forefront of the profession, one is young and healthy, the other is older and has a few health issues but nothing too concerning. The first, the young and healthy gentleman, contracted his illness and was hospitalized within a week. He has had a very difficult course and has nearly died countless times. The other older gentleman was sick at home for nearly 3 weeks and took a long time to regain energy and return to work, but he did. Would I, or any professional, have predicted that the young one would be critically ill and the other recover more easily? Nope. But that's the scary thing about Covid-19. You don't know what's going to happen and as doctors we don't know either. As such, we treat everyone like there is the possibility of them getting very sick. Remember right now we don't have any treatments that are proven to work on preventing or treating Covid 19...we can only support your body as it fights its way through this horrid illness.
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