3 ms·

Making it the worse pandemic in decades but no where near the Spanish Flu.

by izend 6y ago

mmastrac 6y ago
Hard to compare directly against the Spanish Flu as medicine has had 100 years of progress, but assuming you are talking about overall impact, agreed.
- glofish 6y ago
  not to mention the Spanish Flu hit children just as hard as the old.
- cozzyd 6y ago
  The age distribution was also significantly different then.
vladislav 6y ago
The Spanish flu had a smaller outbreak in the Spring and came back with a vengeance the following Fall, so hold that thought. https://www.history.com/news/spanish-flu-second-wave-resurgence https://www.history.com/news/spanish-flu-second-wave-resurge...
rechristened 6y ago
Or as bad as the 1957-8 "Asian Flu" that most people haven't even heard of.
dragonwriter 6y ago
Well, sure, but the “Spanish” flu (only called that because Spain is the first country severely hit that didn't lie and cover it up because of WWI) was accelerated by both the physical conditions created by WWI and the fact that covering it up to avoid revealing weakness to wartime opponents hampered response in many early-hit countries and obstructed information flow. It's also nowhere near the HIV/AIDS global epidemic in likely total impact, but it's a lot more acute in it's impact than HIV/AIDS.
- downerending 6y ago
  > only called that because... Also worth noting that a huge number of names in biology are quite arbitrary and/or accidents of history. Or tech, for that matter. Fewer and fewer "hard disks" involve any actual disk, and more non-floppy floppy disks were made than actual floppy ones. Etc.
mrb 6y ago
I disagree. It's simply too early to make that determination. The Spanish Flu had a estimated infection fatality ratio of >2.5% (https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article). As another commenter pointed out, the COVID-19 IFR is 0.9% in NYC. The difference between 2.5% and 0.9% is only 2.8x. However the IFR is not only underestimated due to the lag between case detection and death, but it's also probably a lot worse in many other parts of the world (third world countries, etc). So it's possible the difference is only 2-fold, which would make both pandemics relatively comparable.
- umeshunni 6y ago
  Another factor to consider is that healthcare today is much better than when the Spanish flu occurred and that could explain the 2x difference.

Making it the worse pandemic in decades but no where near the Spanish Flu.

by izend 6y ago

Making it the worse pandemic in decades but no where near the Spanish Flu.

Hard to compare directly against the Spanish Flu as medicine has had 100 years of progress, but assuming you are talking about overall impact, agreed.

glofish 6y ago
not to mention the Spanish Flu hit children just as hard as the old.
cozzyd 6y ago
The age distribution was also significantly different then.

vladislav 6y ago

The Spanish flu had a smaller outbreak in the Spring and came back with a vengeance the following Fall, so hold that thought. https://www.history.com/news/spanish-flu-second-wave-resurgence https://www.history.com/news/spanish-flu-second-wave-resurge...

rechristened 6y ago

Or as bad as the 1957-8 "Asian Flu" that most people haven't even heard of.

dragonwriter 6y ago

Well, sure, but the “Spanish” flu (only called that because Spain is the first country severely hit that didn't lie and cover it up because of WWI) was accelerated by both the physical conditions created by WWI and the fact that covering it up to avoid revealing weakness to wartime opponents hampered response in many early-hit countries and obstructed information flow. It's also nowhere near the HIV/AIDS global epidemic in likely total impact, but it's a lot more acute in it's impact than HIV/AIDS.

downerending 6y ago
> only called that because... Also worth noting that a huge number of names in biology are quite arbitrary and/or accidents of history. Or tech, for that matter. Fewer and fewer "hard disks" involve any actual disk, and more non-floppy floppy disks were made than actual floppy ones. Etc.

mrb 6y ago

I disagree. It's simply too early to make that determination. The Spanish Flu had a estimated infection fatality ratio of >2.5% (https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article). As another commenter pointed out, the COVID-19 IFR is 0.9% in NYC. The difference between 2.5% and 0.9% is only 2.8x. However the IFR is not only underestimated due to the lag between case detection and death, but it's also probably a lot worse in many other parts of the world (third world countries, etc). So it's possible the difference is only 2-fold, which would make both pandemics relatively comparable.

umeshunni 6y ago
Another factor to consider is that healthcare today is much better than when the Spanish flu occurred and that could explain the 2x difference.