Infectious diseases

Name: Spanish influence

Year: 1918-1920

Contagions: 500,000,000

Dead: 50,000,000

It owes its name to the fact that the first to notify it was the Spanish press, one of the few in Europe not to be subjected to war censorship.

It was the first of all pandemics caused by the H1N1 flu virus.

The viral sub-variant associated with it does not have a completely clear origin, but the virus is believed to have made a jump in species, from birds to humans. Only later would it spread among pigs, to then give, after gene recombination, other sub-variants, protagonists of other pandemics.

The strain was recognized already in 1933, but isolation occurred only in 1997, thanks to the viral genetic material obtained from the lung tissue of some corpses, buried in Alaska’s permafrost.

To date, it remains the most lethal pandemic in history. Entire villages, especially among the Native Americans or the Aborigines, were exterminated.

Among the causes of the high mortality rate, in addition to a high aggressiveness of the virus itself, there are the absence of specific therapies (vaccines, antivirals), both for bacterial superinfections (antibiotics) and the state of debilitation of the population , due to the conflict just ended.

Source: web