Flu viruses come in seasonal waves. I really enjoyed it. Another advantage is medical care. This led me, naturally, to the last major worldwide outbreak: the 1918 influenza. COVID-19 may exhibit a very different pattern. And our ability to administer intensive care is quite limited. Change ). Excellent reading, especially if one is interested in the history of pandemics and for understanding how little humans appear to learn from them. The 1918 virus struck first in spring, receded in summer, and then returned in autumn and one last time in the winter of 1919. The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History by John M. BarryMy rating: 4 of 5 stars. In the Fiji Islands, 14 percent of its population succumbed; in Western Samoa, twenty-two percent; and in Labrador, a third of the population died. Dismiss, Given current events, I thought it would be appropriate to dig up my old copy of, Procter & Gamble (P&G): 17,600 Products Could Be Affected By Coronavirus Due To Supply Chain, What Everyone’s Getting Wrong About the Toilet Paper Shortage. What was lacking, for me, were sections on the cultural impact of the disease.But perhaps there are not so many. My slow reading was about library holds that showed up and book club books up for discussion, and no detriment to this very interesting panoramic picture of the pandemic that encompassed the history of immunology, virology, and medical education, as well as wartime politics and some great portraits of the scientists and doctors involved. I found myself glued to each page and engrossed in every detail. Antibiotics (which did not exist in 1918) can save many lives. Copyright LibraryThing and/or members of LibraryThing, authors, publishers, libraries, cover designers, Amazon, Bol, Bruna, etc. I have noticed the same thing myself. In 1918 they were able to administer oxygen, but far less effectively than we can. (Barry does have one fairly controversial claim in the book: that Woodrow Wilson contracted the flu while negotiating the treaty of Versailles, and that it caused him to capitulate to Clemenceau’s demands. They write about the horrors that people inflict on people. I'm an English teacher and book nerd living in Madrid. I did wish he had spent more time on other countries—especially on India, which suffered horribly. It makes me fear for return of the the Coronavirus in the Fall in a more fatal version. Police are again wearing masks, hospitals are again overrun, and officials are struggling to catch up with the progress of the virus.But of course, there are many important differences, too. When you use our affiliate links, you support the writing you enjoy without necessarily buying our products. Each burst can release thousands of copies. Now we can isolate the virus (which they could not do in 1918), test individuals for it, and work on a vaccine. ( Log Out /  They write about the Holocaust. It's bloated and repetitive and verbose and wordy and ... umm, did I mention it's repetitive? It was so long that Audible split its audiobook file into three parts, and a huge portion of the first section was concerning, not the 1918-1919 pandemic, but the history of medical education in America. In this book, Barry traces the history of what happened in that year and extracts lessons for us to follow in our age. Excellent history of the 1918 Flu epidemic. An interesting study of the 1918 pandemic, though a good part of the book is taken up with the history of medicine prior to the pandemic and afterwards. Fast and cheap air travel allowed the virus to spread more quickly. The year 1918 had the worst attack of the flu worldwide. I had to double-check the publication date, because it's somewhat frightening how well understood and readily apparent the problems which have played out in 2020 were years previously. A virus is basically a free-floating piece of genetic code incased in a protein shell. The underlying story is really interesting, because the 1918 epidemic broke out right as the science was almost at a point to take serious steps to identify the pathogen and fight it, but the science was no match for the speed of the attack. To quote one of my favorite SCTV lines, "OOOOOO! Particularly rewarding is the book's efforts to tell the history of medical education and research in the USA as well as the story of how researches strove to understand what was happening and to find a cure or treatment. John Barry is a talented author. If you purchase products on Amazon through any of our affiliate links, we get a small percentage of the transaction, at no extra cost to you. Thank you for helping to support our work, however you choose to do so. As we witness countries and states compete for supplies, this vulnerability is very apparent.But of course we have many advantages, too. President Woodrow Wilson may have been just as bad as our current president, though for different reasons. Arguably a much bigger advantage is information technology. War preparations went on unabated. The author pretty much covers the entire history of medicine and research development in the United States, then includes how viruses exist, spread, and mutate. (However we would appreciate if you would do that too!) One is the disease itself. In thinking about our current state of world shutdown, I thought it would be a good review, and I realized I should tell the rest of you about it. The Great Influenza is a Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. While the information you might be really searching for doesn’t begin until chapter 14 or so, all the previous chapters provide the necessary background to really understand what occurred. The world has changed a lot since 1918. Wow, this was a terribly written book—repetitive purple prose. The last chapter on where we are now and how well we are prepared for the next event is very telling in light of current events. What is more, the pandemic did not seem to exacerbate existing racial or class tensions. Barry notes how newspapers all across the country consistently downplayed the danger, which ironically only further increased panic. If this is true, it would be a major historical consequence. Because of the grave state of the world right now, I decided I needed to know more about the 1918 Influenza pandemic. In both cases, no vaccine is available and no known treatment is effective. Scary, boys and girls!". The Great Influenza is a history of the Spanish Influenza epidemic that began during World War I. I read the letters he sent to his mother, describing the experience.John Barry’s account of this virulent flu is sobering to say the least. It was an amazing read when I read it for a college course. The nickname just seemed too informal for the context of this book. The rate at which the virus replicates within the cells determine the incubation period (between first infection and first symptoms), and coronaviruses replicate significantly more slowly in animal cells, thus explaining the slower onset of symptoms. Apparently they forget the horrors that nature inflicts on people, the horrors that make humans least… My great-grandfather (after whom I was named) was drafted out of Cornell’s veterinary school to work as a nurse in a temporary hospital set up for flu victims. How at that time the government made it worse and helped it spread. Already Spain’s government is talking of adopting universal basic income. Lots of research and data but falls well short of making it meaningful. This information and/or products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Uplifting, because—after our early fumbles—we are finally coordinating as a global community to deal with the crisis. The Great Influenza Summary and Study Guide. In 1918 the American people's fight for their lives in the pandemic was hampered by the first world war and a government that withheld vital information that could have saved lives. What matters is that shutting things down is completely the opposite of what happened during the great influenza. It will give you a deeper understanding of why the shutdowns are currently occurring. The worst part was the conclusion, in which the author discusses how prepared the world is for the spread of a similar pandemic. In the end, being able to reference those notes helped me navigate the book when the book returned to certain people of our history. Many, many useful insights. Honestly, I was looking for a book about the flu to read during flu-season (especially in the year I decided NOT to get the flu shot), and all we get is lengthy biographies about the doctors and people who... well, I'm not even sure how most of them are important to the story. They write about the horrors that people inflict on people. People write about war. I thought Mr. Barry was a historian, but he doubles as a clairvoyant as well. I came across the sentences that I had underlined during my first read identifying errors in basic virology. Apparently the definitive account of the 1918-1920 global H1N1 pandemic. Change ), You are commenting using your Twitter account. The ventilator shortage has become a global emergency in itself, as hospitals are overrun.Medical science has also advanced considerably. Brilliant book. In many ways the virus seems to have swept through communities and then disappeared from memory. In a matter of months, the flu spread across the world and caused between 50 and 100 million deaths. nothing compares to rabies or AIDS, but this was informative, and a warning about how equipped we are to deal with pandemic level disease, especially airborne like H1N1. Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books. This meant that the gap between infection and the first symptoms was short—often within 24 hours—and patients deteriorated far more quickly. Overall though, great book. A global pandemic during a war seems like a terrible coincidence, but in fact, the war helped spread the virus across the globe and likely contributed to the death toll in many ways. (Young people died because their immune systems overreacted in what is called a “cytokine storm.”) The H1N1 flu also had a far shorter incubation period. The Great Influenza is a history of the Spanish Influenza epidemic that began during World War I. Atmospheric conditions—humidity and temperature—also presumably make some difference in the flu virus’s spread. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This is the perfect book to read during the coronavirus outbreak. It is highly contagious and leaves us with few options to counteract. It was not the Dark Ages.The other major piece of historical context is, of course, the First World War. (The pandemic is sometimes called the “Spanish flu,” because the press in neutral Spain was uncensored, and so reported freely on the disease.) It will change how you think about what the flu really means. ( Log Out /  In the early 1900s, modern medicine was just coming into its own. )It is illuminating to compare the 1918 pandemic to the current crisis. I was continually stunned and thought that if only our politicians had read this because we certainly were doomed to repeat it. This is just my speculation.Well, so much for the virus. Click here to apply for our affiliate partnership program. They write about the Holocaust.

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