The last pandemic - the Hong Kong flu 1968/69

I was in southern Germany while serving in the US Army. I have no recollection of the Hong Kong flu

CB I believe you were making the same argument back in February when there was only a handful of cases in North America. Let’s wait to see how this plays out. Flattening the curve doesn’t mean there’ll be less deaths. It just means some of us can get a head start and do something to survive. Those in nursing homes have no way of getting out of the way but sone of us do. As Satchel Paige said “Don’t look back, something might be gaining on you”

The CDC info says about 1 million people died worldwide from Hong Kong flu. And that covered the period from July 1968 to early 1970, a year and a half. We have almost a third that many deaths from COVID in 5 and a half months and the death rate is rising in many places. That flu killed 33,800 in the US. How can you compare that with almost 90,000 deaths in a few months and say coronavirus is no worse?

International travel and tourism has increased hugely since 1968. That is obviously going to spread a highly contagious disease much quicker and wider.

This is not the flu. It’s a whole different animal. Having said that, the viral load or the number of organisms that assault you at that given moment may influence the outcome.. this plus all the other factors already mentioned will determine the end result. Knowing all that go ahead and take a tiny needle of saliva from an infected person, put it ina a glass of water and put a drop of that on your tongue and let us know what happened. I’m dying to know.

More attention is being placed on those having fragile health. There are more senior citizens, patients who are immune compromised for cancer treatments or other ailments. Perhaps our population is not as strong and resilient as it used to be.
Look at what happened when Europeans came to America and decimated the native Americans. There are no easy answers.

Jreboll wrote: Perhaps our population is not as strong and resilient as it used to be.

I absolutely believe this is true. For those of use who are seniors now, our grandparents for sure and even our parents, to a large extent, grew up on real food- there simply wasn't any junk food in existence. As the generations consume more and more junk food (I didn't consume a lot as a child- my mom was health-food conscious even back in the 50's- we had a typical NOB diet of meat and potatoes and a few veggies for the most part, but she didn't buy us sugary breakfast cereals or have candy, pop or other crap around the house).
So for each generation that eats poorly, I think the health of the population gets worse and worse. Then of course there is so much pollution, chemical fertilizers, insecticides, herbicides- this has to take a toll. Even things like electric light- humans used to get up with the sun and go to sleep shortly after the sun went down. I would imagine that living in harmony with the natural world also leads to better health.
There's book called The Tooth Truth, which my daughter had. There are face photos in it of 3 generations of people from a rather isolated tribe somewhere- could have been Africa or the Amazon, I can't remember. The oldest generation has beautiful, perfectly formed teeth. The subsequent generations, when they had access to Coca-cola and other junk shows a breakdown of their teeth- not just cavities, but the actual form of their teeth and jaw changed- gaps between teeth, crooked teeth, overbites and underbites.