[ad_1]
For many of my fellow citizens, and myself, 2018 has brought its share of flu, bronchitis and other seasonal ailments.
Washington County and, in fact, the rest of the Cumberland Valley were shaped by their relationship with disease and disease from the early days of European colonization.
The low altitude of the valley lends itself to heat and moisture traps, resulting in high rates of waterborne diseases such as cholera, dysentery and typhus. These diseases were so common that local newspapers called them "summer sicknesses for children" and even caused significant delays in the construction of the C & O canal. Due to its location along main trade routes, the region was just as vulnerable to global epidemics as many major cities.
A pandemic, however, remains largely neglected in local history: the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic, also known as the 1918 influenza epidemic. While the world was already involved in the First World War a virulent strain of influenza spread like wildfire, causing huge losses for both soldiers and civilians.
The sick soldiers who were convalescing spread the disease to the United States and finally here in Washington County, where it had a major social and cultural impact. But what is the Spanish flu and what was it doing?
The name Spanish flu is a bit unfit – the flu does not come from Spain, nor has it been identified. Many European countries involved in the war began to see influenza cases around the same time, but their governments had issued a ban on the press during wartime.
In the hope of maintaining morale, and not causing national panic, these countries have suppressed information about the disease as long as they could. However, Spain did not have such restrictions on the press and the Spanish press reported this new dangerous disease. As a result, Spain has been incorrectly identified for many years as the source of the epidemic.
In my opinion, the term "flu" is also a bit unsuitable in modern culture. For most of us, the flu will not be a lethal experience (even if it looks like it). Typical annual influenza outbreaks primarily affect immunocompromised individuals, such as children, the sick and the elderly.
The opposite was true with the Spanish flu. People with the strongest immune system were the most affected during the epidemic, especially those aged 18 to 40, which meant those who were most involved in the war effort.
The death rate of the disease has been estimated at around 20%, which is much higher than that of a typical flu. And unlike most cases of influenza, the Spanish strain had a significant impact on the lungs, causing an effect similar to severe pneumonia in patients. Without modern drugs and medical equipment, including antibiotics and antivirals, there is no way for health professionals to help, as patients slowly drown in the death of fluid accumulated in their lungs.
Spanish flu hits home
So what did the Spanish flu look like when it hit Washington County? At the time, Washington County was a kind of contradiction. In a short time, much money was invested in the country, and the manufacturing and industrial industries were strongly promoted. However, much of this income would be invested in public health and in the community only after the First World War.
The young Washington County hospital system and its school of nursing had just moved to its new home, located at the old Kee Mar Women's College, in Antietam Street, and finally had the ability to accept cases of infectious disease.
The city of Hagerstown had not yet installed a municipal sewer system and City Park still housed farmhouses and factories. So while the citizens of the region saw themselves as twentieth century Americans, they were about to discover that, like many other American cities, they were unfortunately unprepared for a global epidemic.
The Countians of Washington were already familiar with the Spanish flu at the time of the appearance of the first cases in the region. Local newspapers, such as The Morning Herald and The Daily Mail, extensively reported on international events, and news films in one of the county's many cinemas raised awareness of the epidemic.
However, at that time, many physicians in the region would have served overseas, which would have resulted in a shortage of available medical staff for influenza patients. It has always been rare to seek a hospital for the treatment of infectious diseases, which means that many citizens of the county have waited too late for treatment. and even if enough doctors and nurses were available, they could hardly offer any treatment. Although the term "flu" has existed for centuries, the virus itself would not be specifically isolated or identified until the 1930s. The Spanish flu has in fact been identified retroactively as a flu.
Thousands of people in Washington County became ill and hundreds of local citizens died. Although many cases probably began in late August or early September, the epidemic reached its peak in October, with local newspapers covering the story of deaths and delirium caused by the flu. State and county authorities adopted emergency measures during the months of October and November 1918 to reduce the tide of diseases, including by banning public gatherings. For the citizens of the county, this meant that the public school was canceled and the theaters closed. For the first time in more than 50 years, the big Hagerstown Fair was canceled. This is particularly revealing of the seriousness of the situation since the 1910s were the zenith of the fair and that it was the largest poultry show in all of North America.
The cause of the end of the flu has also left a scary and macabre epilogue to local citizens. A cold snap in November killed the virus, ending the global pandemic. However, this meant that the ground was frozen early in Washington County, leaving the cemeteries unable to bury the large number of bodies left as a result of the disease. Some cemeteries, such as Hagerstown's Rose Hill Cemetery, actually hold photographs taken at one time in 1918, when coffins were lined up around the gates, extending into South Potomac Street.
It is interesting to note that the exact influenza strain that caused the extra virulent outbreak of 1918 was only identified nearly 100 years later. Teams of researchers from the 1990s and early 2000s struggled to find existing samples from the Spanish flu epidemic for testing purposes. Viable samples to be tested were eventually found among the graves of victims of the Inuit influenza in Alaska, whose population was decimated during the outbreak. The analysis of these samples revealed that the Spanish flu was closely related to modern strains of the H1N1 virus, which we know both as avian and swine flu.
Anna Cueto is a curator at the Washington County Historical Society.
[ad_2]
Source link
