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HIST 234: Epidemics in Western Society Since 1600

Lecture 20 - Pandemic Influenza. Reliable records of influenza, dating back to the 1700s, suggest a pattern of one major pandemic every century. Among the pandemics for which there is solid documentary evidence, the outbreak of 1918-1920 is by far the greatest. The so-called Spanish Lady caused somewhere between 25 and 100 million deaths worldwide. It is distinctive both for its high mortality rate, in comparison to other flu pandemics, and for its unusual demographic effect: whereas the flu typically targets the very young and old, the 1918-1920 epidemic struck adults in the prime of life. Without a cure for the disease, public health authorities today are in a position to learn from the successes and failures of the early-twentieth-century response. (from oyc.yale.edu)

Lecture 20 - Pandemic Influenza

Time Lecture Chapters
[00:00:00] 1. Influenza
[00:05:17] 2. Transmission
[00:09:06] 3. 1889-90 Pandemic
[00:24:00] 4. Spanish Influenza
[00:38:09] 5. Epidemiology and Responses

References
Lecture 20 - Pandemic Influenza
Instructor: Professor Frank Snowden. Transcript [html]. Audio [mp3]. Download Video [mov].

Go to the Course Home or watch other lectures:

Lecture 01 - Introduction to the Course
Lecture 02 - Classical Views of Disease: Hippocrates, Galen, and Humoralism
Lecture 03 - Plague (I): Pestilence as Disease
Lecture 04 - Plague (II): Responses and Measures
Lecture 05 - Plague (III): Illustrations and Conclusions
Lecture 06 - Smallpox (I): "The Speckled Monster"
Lecture 07 - Smallpox (II): Jenner, Vaccination, and Eradication
Lecture 08 - Nineteenth-Century Medicine: The Paris School of Medicine
Lecture 09 - Asiatic Cholera (I): Personal Reflections
Lecture 10 - Asiatic Cholera (II): Five Pandemics
Lecture 11 - The Sanitary Movement and the "Filth Theory of Disease"
Lecture 12 - Syphilis: From the "Great Pox" to the Modern Version
Lecture 13 - Contagionism versus Anticontagionism
Lecture 14 - The Germ Theory of Disease
Lecture 15 - Tropical Medicine as a Discipline
Lecture 16 - Malaria (I): The Case of Italy
Lecture 17 - Malaria (II): The Global Challenge
Lecture 18 - Tuberculosis (I): The Era of Consumption
Lecture 19 - Tuberculosis (II): After Robert Koch
Lecture 20 - Pandemic Influenza
Lecture 21 - The Tuskegee Experiment
Lecture 22 - AIDS (I)
Lecture 23 - AIDS (II)
Lecture 24 - Poliomyelitis: Problems of Eradication
Lecture 25 - SARS, Avian Inluenza, and Swine Flu: Lessons and Prospects
Lecture 26 - Final Q & A