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What's worse: the Spanish flu pandemic or the COVID-19 pandemic?

I think, at this point, people are beginning to understand that having a healthy lifestyle will not save you from the virus, but will only strengthen the immune system and lessen the severity of producing symptoms. I'm just wondering if the Spanish flu was much worse than COVID-19 because, back then, there were no medical treatments aside from vaccines. I don't understand why the current pace of vaccinations are very slow, but it couldn't have been bad as compared back then, right? I've following the news ever since the pandemic started, and a lot of antiviral drugs were recommended, like hydroxychloroquine, remdesivir, dexamethasone, and then ivermectin. Do you think this pandemic is worse, as compared back then when there were no drugs to treat patients? Again, I'm talking about medical treatments, not vaccines, just to put things into perspective.

14 Answers

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  • 2 weeks ago

    Though we are more advanced today, the COVID-19 pandemic is ongoing. Therefore, unlikely to be over any time soon. With several overlapping outbreaks, the entire world continues to be at risk, and as it continues to mutate it becomes more deadly. With that I'd say it's definitely worse.

  • Anonymous
    2 weeks ago

    The Spanish Flu started in a MILITARY CAMP IN KENTUCKY, U.S..  Those boys were healthy and they were young and they were getting sick and dying.

    . Being in a Military Camp it was isolated, and those boys were shipped overseas to SPAIN (where Spanish doctors checked them out as25 would die on the short boat ride over.  As Spain was not involved in WW1 it reported the sickness.  Meanwhile the boatload of sick troops headed inland and up through France and co mingled with them and the British infecting everyone.  So not only was it trench warfare but they were sicker than dogs...and dying in the trenches from the flu.  Then, those men that lasted 2 weeks or whatever, got a chance to go home and infect the people NOT IN THE MILITARY CAMPS.  Now it was in the public domain in the U.S.   And they returned back to the front and maybe still had the flu,(it was a nasty version) and brought it back or a second wave back to the US

    .  The only protection the young doctors and nurses had were masks & social distancing.   We got through it.  In fact I "accidently" discovered the Spanish Flu.  It is not taught in history books.  It is a U.S. disease.

    If they knew anything about flu's then, it was it would be over in 2 weeks.  That is a NORMAL SEASONAL FLU.    This was NASTIER. so different.

    Medicine has come a long way in 100 years so when we have a disease that is NEW then it is DIFFERENT.

    We have more people working on it around the world. Pfizer Germany figured it out first.  Then Moderna U.S.

    They have the ability to transfer testing results over so this can be figured out faster (but they are not doing that.)

    Money is the other disease

  • Anonymous
    2 weeks ago

    Covid-19 by far because we have had to isolate ourselves from the real world which we did not have to do in the Spanish flu.   

  • D1218
    Lv 6
    2 weeks ago

    Covid I guess. You can die in less than 5 days if you have it without the vaccine.

  • ?
    Lv 5
    2 weeks ago

    The spanish flu was way worse than kung flu.

  • 3 weeks ago

    It will depend on how long COVID stays around.  The Spanish flue pandemic of 1918–19, lasted between one and two years in three waves.  If COVID keeps changing in may be with us a long time and kill more.

    The Spanish flu tended to kill young adults 19-30 years old, while at this time COVID is still killing predominantly those that are older but the new strains are impacting younger people.

  • 3 weeks ago

    You're quite correct. The 1918 flu pandemic was worse in that it killed at least 30 mil ppl. But given the lack of health care, medicines & hygiene, I'm sure that greatly contributed to the death toll. By comparison, look at the Covid statistics in undeveloped countries. The ones with the least HC infrastructure have really alarming fatality rates. In Yemen, the mortality rate has been as high as 28%. So there's a huge disparity between first & 3rd world countries.

    Actually, we'll never really know and it's not a fair comparison, after 100 years. I've researched the Spanish flu pandemic and found disturbing accounts about people who literally dropped dead in the streets-- like they were functional one minute, then just suddenly croaked. With mostly anecdotal reports to go on, it's impossible to gauge its true impact. Still, I think it's safe to say that without sophisticated health care & medicines, we'd be hip deep in bodies from coronavirus by now.

  • 3 weeks ago

    i think covid is worse cause they probably didnt stop everything cause of the spanish flu

  • 3 weeks ago

    Have you been asleep for the past year?

    What do you mean a healthy lifestyle will not save you from this virus?

    About 50% of the population appears to be naturally immune.

    And per the CDC information, up to 45% of the people are asymptomatic.

    Your chance of catching covid from someone is no greater than the common cold (your chance of giving it to someone is 50% more than the common cold based on the longer contagion period).

    my friends were staying in a cabin for 4 days with someone who was infected.

    He had no symptoms until 2 days after they returned.

    They were all in their late 40s.  No one caught covid from him, including the 3 people who rode 3+ hours each way to get there with him.

    There ARE medical treatments:

    The anti-inflammatories (not anti-virals) HAVE GREATLY reduced the number of individuals who have illness progression.  Dexamethasone has cut the average hospitalization days in half.  Remdesivir doesn't work for everyone but those it does, it's great.

    Just yesterday, Michigan, began using the Regeneron & Eli Lily antibody therapies as the go to outpatient treatment which has followed months of Marylard being a leader with it.  

    Albuterol and Budesonide have been very beneficial with keeping people from getting covid related pneumonia.

    HCQ is may or not be an effective treatment.  There are recent studies that still say it is.

    And FINALLY it appears that the medical community is starting to recognize that Vitamin D is not just a fluke. 

    -- Last week, the Ireland Joint Commission on Health began requiring all healthcare workers and long term care facility residents to supplement.  And will get out free supplements at their covid testing sites

    - NPR and Apple both had stories this week on the benefits.

    The US population in 1918 was 103M and there were about 675,000 deaths in two years.

    In the past 16 months there have been 565,000 US deaths out of a population 330M.

    ** based on basic numbers you can wee that the % of deaths will about about 1/3 less for the Covid-19 pandemic.

    And is it a pandemic?  The CDC has not released 2020 deaths rates and we still don't know if there was actually an increase in deaths last year or not.

  • Anonymous
    3 weeks ago

    I had COVID last year March 2020 had mild symptoms for 7 days it went away, than last month I hung out with a few friends all day without masks and they ended all tested positive for COVID , I got tested negative but this is the first time they had it and it was mild for them as well so I'm thinking maybe I'm still carrying the antibiotics.  What is the odds everyone gets COVID except me and I'm the only one that had it before. Strange

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