Amid the carnage of the First World War, a flu epidemic took hold in the front-line trenches and subsequently spread around the world, infecting one-quarter of the world’s total population and ultimately killing more people than the war itself.
Before it was over, somewhere between 50 million and 100 million people died from what became known as “the Spanish flu.” The currently accepted mortality rate for the Spanish flu is between one and three per cent, and its total mortality numbers are shocking in part because of its widespread reach, proliferating throughout country after country around the globe.
A familiar name
The Spanish flu pandemic was triggered by a virus that is now a household name: H1N1. H1N1 resurfaced in 2009, again spreading to the far reaches of the planet, but with only a small fraction of the death toll of its first emergence. Continue reading.