[132] Entire Inuit and Alaskan Native village communities died in Alaska. [93][94], Because the virus that caused the disease was too small to be seen under a microscope at the time, there were problems with correctly diagnosing it. Skr. [30] It reached North Africa, India, and Japan in May, and soon after had likely gone around the world as there had been recorded cases in Southeast Asia in April. Enjoy! [28] Failure to take preventive measures in March/April was later criticized. An ambulance waited at Union Station to take any sickly train passengers directly to the hospital upon arrival. [55] New York City alone reported 6,374 deaths between December 1919 and April 1920, almost twice the number of the first wave in spring 1918. [18], Alternative names were also used at the time of the pandemic. The Spanish flu, also known as the 1918 flu pandemic, was an unusually deadly influenza pandemic caused by the H1N1 influenza A virus. [129][130][131] Native American tribes were particularly hard hit. The first confirmed cases originated in the United States. [173] Historian Nancy Bristow has argued that the pandemic, when combined with the increasing number of women attending college, contributed to the success of women in the field of nursing. By the end of the week, more than 4,500 were dead in an outbreak that would claim as many as 100 million people worldwide. The number of war-related deaths of young adults may have overshadowed the deaths caused by flu.[162]. In the trenches, natural selection was reversed. “We should be and must be vigilant.”. [82] The fact that most of those who recovered from first-wave infections had become immune showed that it must have been the same strain of flu. [136], In Ghana, the influenza epidemic killed at least 100,000 people. [25] It then quickly spread to the rest of France, Great Britain, Italy, and Spain, and in May reached Breslau and Odessa. Carried by World War I doughboys returning … [185], The origin of the Spanish flu pandemic, and the relationship between the near-simultaneous outbreaks in humans and swine, have been controversial. In contrast, the first cases of disease among civilians in St. Louis were reported on October 5, and authorities moved rapidly to introduce a broad series of measures designed to promote social distancing, implementing these on October 7. Consequently, during modern pandemics, health officials look for deadlier strains of a virus when it reaches places with social upheaval. One hypothesis is that the virus strain originated at Fort Riley, Kansas, in viruses in poultry and swine which the fort bred for food; the soldiers were then sent from Fort Riley around the world, where they spread the disease. Within days, 522 men at the camp had reported sick. [158], The first estimate of the Chinese death toll was made in 1991 by Patterson and Pyle, which estimated a toll of between 5 and 9 million. The war, however, had initially been expected to end quickly but lasted for four years by the time the pandemic struck. They examined the factors that underlie variability in temporal patterns and their correlation to patterns of mortality and morbidity. A 2009 study in Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses based on data from fourteen European countries estimated a total of 2.64 million excess deaths in Europe attributable to the Spanish flu during the major 1918–1919 phase of the pandemic, in line with the three prior studies from 1991, 2002, and 2006 that calculated a European death toll of between 2 million and 2.3 million. Work shifts were staggered and streetcar ridership was strictly limited. Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items. Post-Dispatch file photo. [83] For the rest of the population, the second wave was far more deadly; the most vulnerable people were those like the soldiers in the trenches – adults who were young and fit.[84]. But it wasn’t always this way, says Richard Hatchett, a physician and head of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations in London, who co-authored the 2007 paper. Some speculate the soldiers' immune systems were weakened by malnourishment, as well as the stresses of combat and chemical attacks, increasing their susceptibility. [64] Further evidence against the disease being spread by Chinese workers was that workers entered Europe through other routes that did not result in a detectable spread, making them unlikely to have been the original hosts. [156] However, some contemporary newspaper and post office reports, as well as reports from missionary doctors, suggest that the flu did penetrate the Chinese interior and that influenza was severe in at least some locations in the countryside of China. With the flu continuing its rampage, Starkloff imposed a stricter quarantine in November, closing down all businesses with few exceptions including banks, newspapers, embalmers and coffin makers, according to Post-Dispatch archives. [78][79] A large factor in the worldwide occurrence of the flu was increased travel. [35] In Madrid, Spain, fewer than 1,000 people died from influenza between May and June 1918. The costs of this delay appear to have been significant; by the time Philadelphia responded, it faced an epidemic considerably larger than the epidemic St. Louis faced. The quarantine on public gatherings is lifted, December 1918, St. Louis Post-Dispatch. In 1918, the city of Philadelphia threw a parade that killed thousands of people. By providing your email, you agree to the Quartz Privacy Policy. Copyright (2007) National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A. • Read about retail stores in the region that are cutting hours or closing due to the coronavirus. [91] The virus also killed people directly by causing massive hemorrhages and edema in the lungs. Humphries, of the Memorial University of Newfoundland in St. John's, based his conclusions on newly unearthed records. Ignoring warnings of influenza among soldiers preparing for World War I, the march to support the war effort drew 200,000 people who crammed together to watch the procession. [36] There were no reported quarantines during the first quarter of 1918. “I think the critical lesson from both the modeling and the historical work is that the benefits of multiple interventions are greatest if they are introduced early (before 1% of the population is infected) and maintained,” wrote Hatchett, who has also directed medical preparedness in the Obama White House. Government actions in the early stages of the virus' arrival in the country in September 1918 are believed to have unintentionally accelerated its spread throughout the country. “The only entry on every page after that had only one word: FLU. Dr. J. Lee Harwell was one of a dozen doctors in Poplar Bluff at the time, said his grandson, Dr. Larry Harwell, 80, of University City. [174], A 2020 study found that US cities that implemented early and extensive non-medical measures (quarantine etc.) [7] One group of researchers recovered the virus from the bodies of frozen victims and transfected animals with it. [224], In 2013, the AIR Worldwide Research and Modeling Group "characterized the historic 1918 pandemic and estimated the effects of a similar pandemic occurring today using the AIR Pandemic Flu Model". Louis. The second wave began, and the flu quickly spread around the world again. But social distancing doesn’t have to be draconian. • Read the list of canceled sports events.