Open AccessA Centenary Tale of Two Pandemics: The 1918 Influenza Pandemic and COVID-19, Part II
Author(s) -
David M. Morens,
Jeffery K. Taubenberger,
Anthony S. Fauci
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
american journal of public health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.284
H-Index - 264
eISSN - 1541-0048
pISSN - 0090-0036
DOI - 10.2105/ajph.2021.306326
Subject(s) - pandemic , influenza pandemic , covid-19 , public health , epidemiology , infectious disease (medical specialty) , human mortality from h5n1 , psychosocial , virology , disease , medicine , history , environmental health , outbreak , psychiatry , pathology
Both the 1918 influenza pandemic and the 2019‒2021 COVID-19 pandemic are among the most disastrous infectious disease emergences of modern times. In addition to similarities in their clinical, pathological, and epidemiological features, the two pandemics, separated by more than a century, were each met with essentially the same, or very similar, public health responses, and elicited research efforts to control them with vaccines, therapeutics, and other medical approaches. Both pandemics had lasting, if at times invisible, psychosocial effects related to loss and hardship. In considering these two deadly pandemics, we ask: what lessons have we learned over the span of a century, and how are we applying those lessons to the challenges of COVID-19?