My husband and I are retired RNs, we are both 70.

[TNNurse]

Out nephew who lives in Chicago called the other day to get our perspective on things. He has a young child, he is 40.

Near the end of the conversation, he asked "have you ever seen anything like this before?". I of course said no. I hope I was able to make him understand that NO ONE ON THIS EARTH HAS SEEN ANYTHING LIKE THIS BEFORE. The flu of 1918 was worldwide but it was a very different world in terms of travel and work. Pretty sure no one who lived through it then and is still alive was old enough to remember how it was. I also replied that it is awful that we are no better prepared 100 years later.

[hlthe2b]

1. We thought H1N1 was going to be this pandemic. We planned accordingly, despite having the same

challenges. It was not the impact that COVID-19 has proven to be, but we WERE better prepared THEN than we are now. There is no denying it. Ask anyone who aided in H1N1 planning and response. We knew what to do. This administration dismantled the systems and voided the planning/response.

[AlexSFCA]

5. not the same

Italy was fine during H1N1, are they worse prepared now? Different virus. Singapore was best prepared this round.

[hlthe2b]

7. Did you fail to read? I stated we thought H1N1 was going to be the major pandemic and planned

accordingly. I NEVER said it was identical. I've been doing disease control for decades now, both domestically and globally. I was in China when H1N1 emerged and active in the first investigations.I was in the ME with the emergence of MERS-CoV I stated the plans we made were anticipating a viral pandemic like COVID-19, not that H1N1 was that pandemic. The concepts for those plans were similar, but never implemented and in fact, dismantled.

I should hope you are not echoing the Trump apologists who claim (wrongly) that this is something we could not have anticipated. We DID and we planned accordingly. His Obama hatred caused him to dismantle EVErYTHING, to handcuff CDC and all other associated health agencies and to make us more vulnerable than at any time in our history to what is happening now.

[NewJeffCT]

11. well put

If that global health emergency infrastructure was still in place and allowed to do their jobs, they would likely have been preparing for Coronavirus since December - not late February/early March and warned the world of what was coming and how to prepare, and locally would have been working with states, cities and towns getting prepared for Corona.

[cilla4progress]

17. Please remind me -

when was that? Who was President?

[hlthe2b]

18. 2009-2010 - Obama

Read the full history here: (WELL worth a full read)
https://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/cdcresponse.htm

[cilla4progress]

20. Thank you.

Will do.

This is a disaster of epic proportions. On so many levels.

And foreseeable.

[appalachiablue]

22. SARS, 2002- 2003, W Bush; H1N1, 2009, Obama;(*MERS, 2012-2013)

From the WHO, https://www.who.int/csr/disease/ebola/ebola-6-months/myths/en

(*few to no cases in US?)

[exboyfil]

27. I went back and watched Obama press conferences

From two weeks after H1N1 first discovered. Someone should cut them together with Trump freakshow. Widely distributed it.

[uponit7771]

2. K&R, CV would not be as big in the US if we had unfettered testing, clear warnings, etc

[3catwoman3]

3. Parents have questions we cannot answer...

...and are wanting reassurances we cannot give. Lousy situation for patient and professionals.

The last thing I feel like doing is going to work tomorrow.

[LiberalArkie]

4. They were a little better prepared back then for the quarantine than people today.

[homegirl]

6. You don't remember

the Summers of polio epidemics, the fear and the fearful aftermaths. Blessings on Jonas Salk, forever.

[Joinfortmill]

30. I remember being grateful I didn't contract polio every summer as a child.

[mgardener]

8. My grandmother told me about 1918

She lived in Brooklyn.
Lots of people she knew died.

[homegirl]

9. My mother

told me about her 14 year old brother who died in Scotland Armistice Day 1918, of the flu.

[stopwastingmymoney]

10. Reading your post I can't help but wonder...

Have you talked about going back to work if you’re needed?

From my reading, it seems the worst danger is the medical system being overwhelmed.

Shortage of ventilators is something I just read about this morning.

Your learned perspectives on this would be most appreciated 😊

[TNNurse]

15. We are no longer licensed to work.

We find our knowledge has decreased in the five years since we retired. We do not remember names of medicines and such and there has of course been a lot of new technology in that time.

We do not have children and will not use any resources that could save parents.

There was an article on npr.org about the supply of emergency supplies that was created in 1999 (guess for Y2K) that is maintained and replenished when expires. Little info on how to get them to places needed. It included ventilators which are serviced regularly. There are ventilators in ORs where they are not going to be doing many elective surgeries, but they may not have the potential for very serious lung problems. You can find the npr.org from Weekend Edition from yesterday. It is not very encouraging.

[exboyfil]

28. Not 70 year olds

[DemoTex]

12. My wife's aunt is 100 - born December 1919.

My wife’s mother is 97. My MIL and her 100 yo sister never knew their older brother. He died, as a young child, of the influenza in 1918.

[MontanaMama]

13. My grandma Pearl lost her identical twin sister, Ruby

in the influenza outbreak of 1918. She said there were many families who lost little ones during that time. Some families lost several children. They lived in the Minneapolis area then.

[Rural_Progressive]

14. Actually there is a brilliant video on YouTube of a woman who lived throught it

well worth the time to watch. You can see her reliving the horror as she tells the story.

&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR3VQCHzEO9bGnyl0XiumNCuIt-ha4xVLBge3JJZtHo3LbMDHK1591gy2Xc

[TNNurse]

16. Thanks,

My mother was born in 1914, she remembered lots of stories that were told.

[cilla4progress]

19. That was fabulous and

amazing. Thank you!

[hlthe2b]

23. Very poignant. She was sharp as a tack there, too. Remarkable life and experiences.

[Sugarcoated]

25. My grandmother went through a similar experience

She was from Austria-Hungary, no one in her family got the flu for some reason. She told me that on the neighboring farm she helped nurse a whole family who was sick and watched them die one by one. My grandmother's family didn't go there to help out of fear but for some reason she did. The family's father was away, I think she said the war, he came back to his wife and, I don't remember how many kids but a lot, like six or seven, gone.

Thanks for sharing this video, this woman's experiences.

[Joinfortmill]

31. Thank you for this

[muriel_volestrangler]

21. Do you have any memories of the 1968-9 flu pandemic?

You might or might not have started study or work during it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_flu_pandemic

Killed about a million worldwide - more than the more recent swine flu. In the age of air travel, though not as extensive as now.

[TNNurse]

24. No, I do not. I was in college studying Sociology.

Nursing was a second idea of a career.

I will read, though, seems like I should know a little.

[littlemissmartypants]

29. I do. I got deathly ill. Photos that were taken that year of me

Show the progression. In one you can see that I am ill. My eyes, puffy and bloodshot and most of all my pallor, like death warmed over, pale and grayish. I especially remember the cough. It was not just hard to breathe it was painful. I also lost more than ten pounds. Scary times.

[Hortensis]

26. Genetic and drug development capabilities are at least

very different. As is supportive care.

Of course, as a counterpart to people travelling everywhere these days, they had a world war that had taken/driven millions from their homes and devastated whole regions, including homes and food supplies.

Interesting comparisons. But I'd far, far rather be here today.

Practice social distancing to protect ourselves and hospital capacities.