Influenza Pandemic: More Severe than World War I
World War I ended in November of 1918, but behind the scenes a new battle was on the rise. As soldiers began to return home, they were unknowingly carrying an infectious disease. A devastating toll of war-related deaths were accounted for, but that does not compare to the global influenza (flu) deaths. Although the violence and new weapons in World War I killed many soldiers, the influenza pandemic of 1918 proved deadlier to a wider range of global citizens. Due to the origination of the influenza virus, the death count compared to World War I, multiple waves with corresponding symptoms, and overall knowledge of the disease, this virus had a greater impact on the world and its citizens than the first world war.
The grand zero of the influenza virus was theorized to be in Europe or Asia. Because World War I was primarily fought in Europe, the battlefields and trenches served as interconnection which transferred the spread of the flu. According to War in History, Mark Osborne Humphries said:
[N]ew research in British and Canadian archives reveals that the 1918 flu most likely emerged first in China in the winter of 1917–18, diffusing across the world as previously isolated populations came into contact with
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Not only does his statement incorporate the groups of people similarly affected, but it also shows what they dealt with by providing visual information that was describing someone infected by influenza virus. Compared to war-related deaths, these typically lasted longer because of the multitude of symptoms being presented to a victim, whereas in war there are casualties, primarily through bullet wounds and gases. Technology, too, was advanced in different areas causing some treatments to be more researched and