back on topic.. I'm feeling like this Corona stuff will be mostly subdued by June 1st, and if I'm right... Trump will win 47 States in November.
Originally Posted by Chung Tran
Unfortunately, there is very likely to be a second wave in the fall. Coronavirus cases may be rising again by election day. In that case, all bets are off.
The Spanish Flu started in early 1918 and one of the earliest cases was actually in the USA. It likely spread on troop ships to Europe as the US mobilized to join the fight in WWI. But the early 1918 strain was not much worse than the regular flu and was not a particularly bad pandemic.
Nonetheless, England, the US, France, and Germany all suppressed reports of the disease to prevent the enemy from knowing about each nation's weaknesses. Only Spain, which was neutral during WWI reported freely on the epidemic. Other nations reported on the Spanish news reports about the flu epidemic and the disease was improperly named "the Spanish Flu".
Had things not changed, that likely would have been the end of it and nobody would really know about the Spanish flu.
But things DID change. The virus mutated in Europe in the summer of 1918 and became far deadlier. Troops were still being shipped around the world, so the now deadlier disease continued to spread and killed huge numbers of people in the fall of 1918.
In 1919, the disease was still deadly, but the war ended and there was far less movement of people. So, the number of deaths dropped off and the pandemic ended in 1920. But only after at least 20 million died worldwide.
Most pandemics have a second wave and in most cases, the second wave is actually less harmful than the first. The Spanish Flu was a big exception.
Let's hope the second wave of the coronavirus this fall is less harmful.