Military and Spanish Influenza during World War I The military strategies and decisions of the United States Military made the Spanish Influenza a disastrous and widespread epidemic from 1918 to 1919, which infected approximately one third of the world’s population (around 500 million people) and killed around 50 million. [1][2] In comparison, World War I only claimed an estimated 16 million life. [4][5][6][7]The flu killed more than war itself. [3] There were three waves of Spanish flu, which occurred
Influenza is well-defined as a minor, but commonly epidemic disease that occurred in several of ways, also caused by numerous of rapidly mutating viral strains. It characterized by the respiratory symptoms and general prostration. The Spanish flu was not a normal epidemic, it was a dangerous pandemic. Epidemics affect individuals at the same time in areas where the disease does not normally spread. A pandemic is an epidemic on a national, international, or global scale. The Spanish flu was different
Overview The Spanish influenza, also known as La Grippe, Spanish Lady, three day fever, purulent bronchitis, sand-fly fever and Blitz Katarrh (The 1918 Influenza Pandemic) was a global disaster which occurred between March of 1918 and the spring season of 1919 (The 1918 Influenza Pandemic). This virus was more catastrophic even than the First World War which was occurring at the same time the influenza broke out, killing more people than the Great War itself (The 1918 Influenza Pandemic). The virus
BACKGROUND OF DISEASE The Spanish influenza was known by a few names such as the “mother of all pandemics” or “La Grippe”. It lasted from 1918 to 1919 and caused a global disaster. It killed more people than the “great war” which is known today as World War I. The Spanish flu took the lives of about 40-50 million people total. The Spanish influenza was so severe that it killed more people in just one year than in the four years of the Black Death Bubonic Plague, which lasted from 1347
Influenza over the years has mutated so many different times that it is hard for scientists to keep up with new and updated versions of vaccines to keep people protected. The Flu for some people can cause major complications such as pneumonia and bronchitis because the Flu attacks the respiratory area, but most people who get the Flu will recover in a few days or up to a few weeks. The 1918 Spanish Flu was the worst epidemic that ever hit the world and the contributing factors of the millions of
virus, the Spanish Influenza, took hold on Americans all over the country. There were three waves of pandemic which struck in the summer of 1918, fall of 1918, and the spring of 1919. After each wave, the virus mutated in order to adapt to the medicines and vaccines developed at the time in turn causing more and more death along the way. Due to the mutating illness, there were over 675,000 deaths in America; there were 50 million deaths worldwide. There were more deaths in one year of influenza pandemic
global community, researchers today are fairly confident in what it will be: a flu. If history has told us anything, it’s that viruses that utilize respiratory and droplet transmission are highly infective. A classic historic example includes the Spanish Influenza of 1918 that killed an estimated 3-5% of the world’s population, leaving families broken and lowered the life expectancy in the United States to just 12 years. In fact, the earliest recorded observation of an epidemic in literature was in 412
THE GREAT INFLUENZA The book The Great Influenza by John Barry takes us back to arguably one of the greatest medical disasters in human history, the book focuses on the influenza pandemic which took place in the year 1918. The world was at war in the First World War and with everyone preoccupied with happenings in Europe and winning the war, the influenza pandemic struck when the human race was least ready and most distracted by happenings all over the world. In total the influenza pandemic killed
Thus little more than average attention was paid to the precursor of a virus that would eventually kill between twenty-one and one-hundred million individuals worldwide (Barry, 2004). Only after the fall wave of the 1918 influenza did it become a requirement to report cases of influenza thus information on this first wave is sporadic at best (Kolata, 1999). I will argue that the nature of this missing data combined
The influenza virus and Streptococcus pneumoniae are two of the most common pathogens to affect humans; both generally pose no major concern to human life but have the potential to cause catastrophic damage to the lives of susceptible individuals. With many strains of the influenza virus being a constant presence around the world, and S. pneumoniae being a normally harmless commensal bacterium residing in the nasal cavities and upper respiratory tract of healthy individuals , it is likely impossible