News media have been breathlessly reporting that the U.S. covid death toll now exceeds the U.S. Spanish flu toll of a century ago.
Technically, I suppose they are not guilty of perjury. Some 701,000 Americans are said to have died of covid versus 675,000 felled by Spanish flu.
Technically, I suppose they are not guilty of perjury. Some 701,000 Americans are said to have died of covid versus 675,000 felled by Spanish flu.
But they fail to mention that the U.S. population in 1918 and 1919 was less than one-third of the current U.S. population (104.5 million then versus 329.5 million now).
The Spanish flu death rate was 0.64%. The covid rate is 0.212%. The covid rate is noticeably lower.
The trench warfare of World War I encouraged the more virulent flu strains, which especially targeted young adults. Covid, on the other hand, can be expected to succeed best in mild strains, though any respiratory infection, whether covid 19, coronavirus or flu, will prove a menace to the aged and immuno-compromised.
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