There was a fearful report on Smithsonian Channel on the flu pandemic of 1918 that killed over 100 million people in America, Europe, Asia and Australia. It started in Kansas in USA with a young man infected.
He soon passed the flu to all his friends and a pandemic was on its way. People died within 24 hours of infection with (1) vomiting (2) diarrhoea (3) bleeding from eyes, nose, ears and mouth (4) stomach pains (4) brain damage (5) pneumonia and (6) stroke.
It was not a pandemic from Spain but the Spanish were not in the war and willing to report on the disaster unlike US doctors who were arrested by police for damaging the war effort. That may explain why the pandemic was given the tag "Spanish". Never blame an allied nation.
There were none of the responses of the modern Governments. The US government was more interested in sending infected soldiers to fight the war against the Germans who soon became infected too.
People died in thousands and were buried in unmarked mass graves. There were none of the steps taken by Governments today such as (1) financial support (2) effort to stave off recession (3) social distancing of citizens (3) medical treatment and (4) staying at home.
At the end of the war, thousands gathered to celebrate and went home with Spanish flu. The US Government applied censorship to the pandemic. Doctors were arrested.
President Woodrow Wilson became infected and died of a stroke and high blood pressure soon after the war ended.
But not before he hit the Germans with draconian reparations for the war. Perhaps Spanish flu was the pre-existing infection.
The TV report stated that he was mentally unbalanced in his last year as president and dominated the proceedings at the Treaty of Versailles.
The report stated that most infections were focused in the US industrial towns that produced steel for World War 1.
The virus just disappeared leaving the people of the world scarred by war and pandemic. Let us hope the coronavirus pandemic just disappears too.
President Woodrow Wilson became infected and died of a stroke and high blood pressure soon after the war ended.
But not before he hit the Germans with draconian reparations for the war. Perhaps Spanish flu was the pre-existing infection.
The TV report stated that he was mentally unbalanced in his last year as president and dominated the proceedings at the Treaty of Versailles.
The report stated that most infections were focused in the US industrial towns that produced steel for World War 1.
The virus just disappeared leaving the people of the world scarred by war and pandemic. Let us hope the coronavirus pandemic just disappears too.
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