THE SPANISH FLU
The Pandemic of the Century
The 1918 Flu Pandemic, aka the Spanish flu, was a global influenza pandemic caused by the H1N1 Influenza virus that infected an estimated 500 million people worldwide - one third of the world population at the time. Although incomplete medical records from the time make it hard to be precise, as many as 50 million worldwide are believed to have died as a result of the pandemic. The Spanish flu was the first of two pandemics caused by the H1N1 influenza virus; the second was the swine flu of 2009.
The first wave of the pandemic occurred in the spring of 1918 and its symptoms were mild. The sick experienced typical flu symptoms (fever, chills, and fatigue) and usually recovered within several days. Few people died. A second, more contagious wave resurfaced in the fall of 1918. Victims died within hours to days. It is believed that the virus likely mutated to a more deadly form. In fact, October 1918 saw the highest fatality rate of the whole pandemic. Researchers have since discovered what made the second wave of the Spanish flu so dangerous - a group of three genes enabled the virus to weaken their hosts’ respiratory systems thus clearing the path for bacterial super infection.
To this day, it is still unknown where the deadly flu originated. Some historians suppose that the flu originated on the Western Front, since its appearance seems to coincide with the final few months of World War l, during the spring of 1918. Soldiers living in damp, dirty, and cramped conditions were particularly susceptible due to their weakened immune systems. When the troops returned home that fall, the flu spread throughout local towns, across countries, and across the ocean. Though first observed in Europe, the United States and parts of Asia, it quickly spread around the world.
Despite what its name might suggest, the Spanish flu did not originate in Spain. As a neutral country during World War l, Spain was one of the only countries whose media freely reported the outbreak in the news.