NARRATOR: In 2017, more than 37% of adults in the U.S.
got a flu shot.
Roughly 80,000 died from the virus in the US.
But in 1918, there was no flu shot,
and at least 50 million people died around the world.
That flu was known as the Spanish Flu,
and it is the second deadliest plague in history,
after, well, "the" Plague in the 1300s.
So how exactly did a flu virus cause
such massive death and destruction across the world?
Well it helps to pinpoint where it started, except we
can't, not with 100% certainty.
It could have been the disease stricken trenches of World War
I. Or maybe the Shanxi Province of China, where
the outbreak of a respiratory disease in 1917
may have actually been the flu virus.
Or maybe even Camp Funston, a military base in Kansas
where 48 soldiers died of flu-like symptoms
right before an outbreak.
What we do know for sure is that the Spanish
Flu didn't start in Spain.
So then why is it called the Spanish Flu?
Well, the flu broke out during World War I. Neither the allied
nor central powers wanted to admit to additional loss
of life during a conflict that hinged on who had more
manpower, so all the nations involved in the war
limited reports of the outbreak.
In the US, some people were even afraid that reporting the flu
might violate the "Sedition Act of 1918,"
a law that prohibited disloyal language
about the government and any action
against the prosecution of the war.
But Spain wasn't in World War I. And since they
had no reason to hide anything, they reported
their flu-related deaths.
Even the King of Spain, Alfonso XIII got the disease,
but ultimately survived.
So with the spotlight on Spain, US and European news outlets
nicknamed it the Spanish Flu.
But the flu was spreading well outside of Spain.
And with a large scale of infections going unreported,
no one was prepared for the deadly pandemic
it would become.
Today, we know the flu is a highly contagious
viral infection that spreads to the nose, throat,
and sometimes the lungs.
Symptoms, such as fever, nausea, aches, and a sore throat,
are all standard.
It's a terrible possibly fatal disease that confines
the afflicted to bed for days.
But the 1918 Flu was worse.
Dark spots would appear on the body
before the skin turned blue from a lack of oxygen
in their blood.
And patients would bleed from their noses and ears,
as they suffocated on their own blood and fluids.
In 1918, at Camp Funston, US army doctor Roy Grist
remarked, "It is only a matter of a few hours
then until death comes, and it is simply a struggle for air
until they suffocate.
It is horrible."
The outbreak at Camp Funston affected more than 1,000
soldiers and killed 47.
But those 1,000 were part of 1 million
soldiers throughout Kansas who were all
in contact with one another.
Those soldiers were then sent overseas in the spring of 1918,
carrying flu microbes that would spread faster than the war
itself.
In the fall of that same year, a second wave of flu cases
started spreading across the US, hitting both
military and civilian centers.
Doctors had never before seen such a deadly strain
of influenza.
To make matters worse, knowledge of viruses at the time
was limited, since microscopes of the day
were not powerful enough to see them.
People began blaming the Germans,
claiming they were spreading poison clouds
or that Bayer, which was a German owned company,
had infected their aspirin.
As the flu spread in America, even public health officials
began to lie about the state of things,
like Philadelphia's public health director Wilmer Krusen,
who, in September of 1918, declared, "no concern whatever
is felt," after a Navy ship from Boston
arrived with infected passengers.
The next day, two sailors died.
The day after that, 14.
There was little to be done to stop the spread of the virus.
Doctors had no way to create a vaccine, antiviral drugs,
or even antibiotics for secondary infections,
like pneumonia.
Instead, most prevention efforts focused
on quarantine and personal hygiene.
Schools, churches, and other public gathering spaces
were shut down in many cities.
In San Francisco, they went so far as
to fine people $5 who didn't wear protective masks,
dubbing them "mask slackers."
And in the end, after only one year,
the death toll was catastrophic.
To put things in perspective, more than 16 million people
died in World War I. The Spanish Flu killed
at least 50 million people.
And some believe the number may be closer to 100 million.
In the US alone, 675,000 people will die from the flu.
That's more American deaths than American soldiers
who died in World War I. It's more
than all the deaths of American soldiers
in the 20th century combined.
And in October of 1918, 195,000 Americans
died, making it the deadliest month in US history.
Death was so prevalent between the war and flu
that life expectancy in the US dropped by 12 years.
Even Woodrow Wilson was affected by the Spanish Flu,
having collapsed during the Versaille Peace Conference
with flu-like symptoms.
The outbreak of Spanish Flu is what spurred the development
of a vaccine, although scientists didn't even
isolate the influenza virus for study
until 1933, 15 years later.
The first flu vaccine was developed in 1938
and was later given to US soldiers in World War II.
After the war, it was finally used
to treat the American public.
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