WW1 Armistice Exhibition - Spanish Flu

The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918

• The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, the deadliest in history, infected an estimated 500 million people worldwide—about one-third of the planet’s population—and killed an estimated 20 million to 50 million victims.
• On any count, it certainly killed more people than the war.
• Recent research has suggested that it originated in a camp in Etaples
• The virus itself was a strain of H1N1 , the same combination underpinning the “swine flu” pandemic of 2009-10.
• The 1918 flu was first observed in Europe, the United States and parts of Asia before swiftly spreading around the world. At the time, there were no effective drugs or vaccines to treat this killer flu strain.