A Cruel Wind: Pandemic Flu in America, 1918-1920

by Dorothy A. Pettit, Ph.D. and Janice Bailie, Ph.D.

Description

The flu pandemic that began in 1918 touched with illness and/or death virtually every family in America. It was a devastating time, as in terms of human mortality, the influenza pandemic of 1918 to 1920 far overshadowed the carnage of World War I, killing more people in less time than any disease before or since. Indeed, it is estimated that 25% to 30% of the world’s population had clinically apparent illnesses and—of that group—approximately 2.5%-5% died. Making the disease even more frightening was the fact that the cause of influenza was unknown in 1918. It was not until the 1930’s that a virus was discovered to be the causative agent. In early 1918 pneumonia deaths were already abnormally high, so when a deadly wave of influenza began in the fall, physicians did not know if they were dealing with a new disease, or if their patients had the more familiar “grippe.” Regardless, there was little that they could do to provide relief. Adding to the general fear was the fact that the highest mortality rates were among those aged twenty-to-forty, usually the healthiest members of society.

The authors—a 20th Century American historian and a biochemist—have drawn from the medical literature, newspaper accounts and letters diaries, memoirs, oral histories and government documents to write this social history describing what it was like to live during the 1918-20 flu pandemic. While they agree with the depiction of the United States in the postwar years as being a “tired nation,” they differ with those who argue that the nation was tired in a spiritual sense. Instead, they contend that the widespread postwar apathy was as much the result of a lingering physical sickness as it was a general spiritual depression.

The virus spread “like a tidal wave,” peaking in the United States in October, 1918, when 20,000 Americans died during one week. While still available, caskets for children in one city were stacked in the streets ten feet high for blocks at a time. Eventually no caskets were available and those who died were buried in mass graves. Hundreds of thousands of children lost parents; in New York City alone, 21,000 children lost both parents to influenza.

Numbers, however, do not reflect the horrific nature of the pandemic, because—for those who perished—it was often a gruesome death. Described as a “pathological nightmare,” victims bled from their nose, ears and eyes, vomited blood and coughed so hard that they cracked their ribs and burst their lungs. When death finally came, it was with the patient turning blue while struggling for air, finally expiring from suffocation while drowning in their own blood.

The fall 1918 wave remained at an epidemic level for a remarkable thirty-one weeks. Churches, theaters, and places of assembly were often closed for months at a time; election campaign strategies had to be radically altered; and, after the war ended in November, 1918, influenza struck many of those who traveled to Paris to negotiate terms for the Treaty of Versailles. The spring following the Armistice was also an unhealthy time, as it was in 1920 when a third major wave of respiratory disease claimed another 100,000 American lives.

Because so many died—675,000 in the United States and 50-100 million worldwide—and, because so many experts believe that it is not a matter of if the world will encounter another 1918-like flu pandemic, but when, this book should be considered essential reading for those interested in learning what worked—and didn’t—during that grim time.