We had a pandemic scare when Ford was in office.

[leftyladyfrommo]

It was a kind of flu they were afraid would kill millions.

They came out with a shot. It was a very big deal.

The pandemic never happened but the government response to the situation was huge.

Hopefully warmer, moist air will stop it.

Scary stuff.

[Wounded Bear]

1. This isn't the flu, and there are cases in Brazil and Africa and Australia...

Australia is in summer, headed to fall now. Not sure hoping for warm weather will matter much.

[Igel]

2. I've had the flu in summer.

It's not like there's no influenza transmission in warmer, more humid conditions.

It's gradient. Warmer means less transmission, more humid means less transmission. Hot and humid =/= zero transmission, however.

Whether it affects this coronavirus is an open question, but reducing it to a strict binary is an error.

[yellowcanine]

3. It was swine flu. And the vaccine was a disaster.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_swine_flu_outbreak

In 1976, an outbreak of the swine flu, Influenza A virus subtype H1N1 at Fort Dix, New Jersey caused one death, hospitalized 13, and led to a mass immunization program. After the program began, the vaccine was associated with an increase in reports of Guillain-Barré Syndrome, which can cause paralysis, respiratory arrest, and death. The immunization program was ended after approximately 25% of the population of the United States had been administered the vaccine.

Richard Krause, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases from 1975 to 1984, writes that the government response to the swine flu outbreak was considered to be too fast and the response to the AIDS epidemic too slow.[1]


The political fall out may have hurt Ford in the 1976 election, which he narrowly lost to Jimmy Carter.
Lesson learned from this episode (by everybody except Trump, apparently) was to do a better job of testing vaccines before mass immunizations.

[leftyladyfrommo]

7. I kind of remember that. I just couldn't remember what it was that happened.

I just remember that there was this huge ta do on TV and that the whole thing flopped for some reason and was quickly forgotten. I was too young to really understand what was happening.

[Aristus]

8. I remember my Dad got the swine flu vaccine and it knocked him out.

He came home and slept for three days.

Let this be a lesson to anti-vaxxers: if a vaccine is harmful, it is withdrawn. So if the MMR and other immunizations were causing patients to grow horns and a tail, they would be discontinued.

[beachbumbob]

4. I remember no such thing.

[virgogal]

5. I don't remember this either.

[Greybnk48]

6. My ex-husband and I both caught swine flu and

it was hellacious! It was 1975 or 76, going by where I worked at the time. We both had sky-high fevers. I got it first and every joint in my body felt like someone was jamming knives in them for like two days, one day worse than the other. I was sick for about a week and as I started to get better, he got it. He ended up with pneumonia from it, I did not.

He and I also caught the Hong Kong flu in the late 1969. Really bad fever, nausea and some aches but not like Swine flu. It lasted about a week.

I really hope to never have a real flu again!