1918 was a viral pandemic. Penicillin and antibiotics would have been useless even if they were available because they work on bacteria, not viruses. You need a vaccine to fight a virus; there was no vaccine for the flu in 1918, and there's no vaccine for COVID-19 today. It's the same situation. And viruses can mutate, which is why we need flu shots every year - it's never the same virus each time.
As Hugh pointed out, the government deliberately kept information about the flu from the public because of the war effort. 1918 wasn't the dark ages where they treated people by blood-letting - they knew then how disease was transmitted. Ever hear of Walter Reed? They named a medical center in Washington after him.
The medical community could have taken steps to warn people to avoid contact with others who might be infected, but the government clampdown on the information about the spread of the flu prevented them from doing so.
Despite what Trump says, a vaccine for COVID-19 is at least a year away from being deployable. The best we can hope for is that COVID-19 (a variant of the SARS virus) does the same thing as its predecessor and suddenly goes away. |
| Messages in this Thread |
|  Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - MikeC/TX on 3/7/20 6:36pm |
|  Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - Luckydog on 3/8/20 11:04am |
|  Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - NK_UT on 3/8/20 11:55am |
|  I guess the $8.3 billion bill signed Friday - Linda_H/FL on 3/8/20 12:47pm |
|  Re: I guess the $8.3 billion bill signed Friday - bagger on 3/8/20 2:29pm |
|  Re: I guess the $8.3 billion bill signed Friday - shooterclay on 3/8/20 4:15pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - MikeC/TX on 3/8/20 5:30pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - bagger on 3/9/20 8:25am |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - MikeC/TX on 3/9/20 4:42pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - MikeC/TX on 3/8/20 5:18pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - Luckydog on 3/8/20 6:17pm |
| Yes, seriously, 1918 - HisHughness on 3/8/20 9:31pm |
| Re: Yes, seriously, 1918 - Luckydog on 3/9/20 9:36am |
|  Re: Yes, seriously, 1918 - bagger on 3/9/20 9:52am |
| Re: Yes, seriously, 1918 - HisHughness on 3/9/20 10:26am |
|  Re: Yes, seriously, 1918 - bagger on 3/9/20 11:35am |
| Re: Yes, seriously, 1918 - Luckydog on 3/10/20 10:55am |
 | Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - MikeC/TX on 3/9/20 5:19pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - bagger on 3/8/20 7:33pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - MikeC/TX on 3/9/20 5:27pm |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - Luckydog on 3/10/20 10:17am |
| Re: Breaking: An attendee at the CPAC conference last week - bagger on 3/10/20 11:11am |
