How U.S. Cities Tried to Halt the Spread of the 1918 Spanish Flu

[BigmanPigman]

https://www.history.com/news/spanish-flu-pandemic-response-cities

"How U.S. city officials responded to the 1918 pandemic played a critical role in how many residents lived—and died."

"In the late summer of 1918, the devastating second wave of the Spanish flu arrived on America’s shores. Carried by World War I doughboys returning home from Europe, the newly virulent virus spread first from Boston to New York and Philadelphia before traveling West to infect panicked populations from St. Louis to San Francisco. When it was all over, the Spanish flu killed an estimated 675,000 Americans among a staggering 20 to 50 million people worldwide. Certain U.S. cities fared far worse than others, though, and looking back more than a century later there’s evidence that the earliest and most well-organized responses slowed the spread of the disease—at least temporarily—while cities that dragged their feet or let down their guard paid a heavier price."

Philadelphia Holds a Parade
St. Louis Flattened the Infection Curve
San Francisco Enforces Wearing Masks

"But San Francisco’s luck ran out when the THIRD wave of the Spanish flu struck in January 1919. Believing masks were what saved them the first time, businesses and theater owners fought back against public gathering orders. As a result, San Francisco ended up suffering some of the highest death rates from Spanish flu nationwide. The 2007 analysis found that if San Francisco had kept all of its anti-flu protections in place through the spring of 1919, it could have reduced deaths by 90 percent."

*All the cities, despite their various approaches and leadership, had 2nd and 3rd waves hit.

[Karadeniz]

1. Good info...want to see a count of how many lives were lost due to Trump, GOP inertia.