1889–1890 flu pandemic


The 1889–1890 flu pandemic, also known as the "Asiatic flu" or "Russian flu", was a deadly influenza pandemic that killed about 1 million people worldwide. It was the last great pandemic of the 19th century.
The most reported effects of the pandemic took place October 1889 – December 1890, with recurrences in March – June 1891, November 1891 – June 1892, winter 1893–1894 and early 1895.
It is not known for certain what [|agent] was responsible for the pandemic. Since 1950s it has been conjectured to be Influenza A virus subtype H2N2. A 1999 seroarcheological study asserted the strain to be Influenza A virus subtype H3N8. A 2005 genomic virological study says that "it is tempting to speculate" that the virus might have been not actually an influenza virus, but human coronavirus OC43.

Outbreak and spread

Modern transport infrastructure assisted the spread of the 1889 influenza. The 19 largest European countries, including the Russian Empire, had 202,887 km of railroads and transatlantic travel by boat took less than six days. It was the first pandemic to spread not just through Eurasia, but throughout the world.
The flu was first reported in the Central Asian city of Bukhara in the Russian Empire, in May 1889, with up to two-thirds of the local population dying. Through the Trans-Caspian railway, it was able to spread further into Samarkand by August, and Tomsk, 3,200 km away by October. Since the Trans-Siberian Railway had not yet been constructed, spread in the eastern direction was slowed down, but it reached the westernmost station of the Trans-Caspian, Krasnovodsk, and from there the Volga trade routes which carried it by November to Saint Petersburg and Moscow. By mid-November Kiev was infected, and the next month the Lake Baikal region was as well, followed by the rest of Siberia and Sakhalin by the end of the year.
From St. Petersburg, the flu spread via the Baltic shipping trade to Vaxholm in early November 1889, and then to Stockholm and the rest of Sweden, infecting 60% of the population within eight weeks. First Norway, and then Denmark, followed soon after. The German Empire first received it in Poznań in December, and on the 12th, 600 workers were reported sick in Berlin and Spandau, with the cases in the city reaching 150,000 within a few days and ultimately half of its 1,5 million inhabitants. Vienna was also infected around the same time. Rome was reached by 17 December. The flu also arrived in Paris that month, and towards its end had spread to Grenoble, Toulon, Toulouse, Lyon, and Ajaccio. At this point Spain was also infected, killing up to 300 a day in Madrid. London got it the same time, from where it then spread quickly to Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, and Dublin.
The first case on American soil was reported on 18 December 1889. It then quickly spread throughout the East Coast and all the way to Chicago and Kansas in days. The first death, Thomas Smith of Canton, Massachusetts, was reported on 25 December. San Francisco and other cities were also reached before the month was over, with the total US death toll at about 13,000. From there it spread south to Mexico and further down, reaching Buenos Aires by 2 February.
Port Natal in South Africa was reached in November 1889, while India received it in February 1890, as did Singapore and Indonesia by March. These were followed by Japan, Australia, and New Zealand by April, and then China in May, and then returned to its original starting point in Central Asia.
In four months it had spread throughout the Northern Hemisphere. Deaths peaked in Saint Petersburg on 1 December 1889, and in the United States during the week of 12 January 1890. The median time between the first reported case and peak mortality was five weeks. In Malta, the Asiatic Flu took hold between January 1889 and March 1890, with a fatality rate of 4%, and a resurgence in January–May 1892 with 66 fatalities. When this flu began, whether it was contagious was debated, but its quick action and pervasiveness across all climates and terrains proved that it was.

Responses

Medical treatment

There was no standard treatment of the flu, with Quinine and Phenazone used, as well as small doses of Strychnine and larger ones of whiskey and brandy, and as cheaper treatments linseed, salt and warm water, and glycerin. Many people also thought that fasting would 'starve' the fever, based on the belief that the body would not produce as much heat with less food; this was in fact poor medical advice. Furthermore, many doctors still believed in the miasma theory of diseases, and neglected the possibility of infectious spread of disease. For example, notable professors of the University of Vienna, Hermann Nothnagel and Otto Kahler claimed that the disease was not contagious.

Public health

A result of the Asiatic flu in Malta is that influenza became for the first time a compulsorily notifiable illness.

Identification of virus subtype responsible

Influenza virus

Researchers have tried for many years to identify the subtypes of Influenza A responsible for the 1889–1890, 1898–1900 and 1918 epidemics. Initially, this work was primarily based on "seroarcheology"—the detection of antibodies to influenza infection in the sera of elderly people—and it was thought that the 1889–1890 pandemic was caused by Influenza A subtype H2, the 1898–1900 epidemic by subtype H3, and the 1918 pandemic by subtype H1. With the confirmation of H1N1 as the cause of the 1918 flu pandemic following identification of H1N1 antibodies in exhumed corpses, reanalysis of seroarcheological data has indicated that Influenza A subtype H3, is a more likely cause for the 1889–1890 pandemic.

Coronavirus

After the SARS epidemic, virologists started sequencing and comparing human and animal coronaviruses, and comparison of two virus strains in the Betacoronavirus 1 species, Bovine coronavirus and Human coronavirus OC43 indicated that they had a most recent common ancestor in the late 19th century, with several methods yielding most probable dates around 1890. Authors speculated that an introduction of the former strain to the human population might have caused the epidemic.

Pathology

Patterns of mortality

The young, the old, and those with underlying conditions were most at risk, and usually died of pneumonia or heart attack caused by physical stress. Due to generally lower standards of living, worse hygiene, and less-developed medicine, the numbers of vulnerable people were higher than in the contemporary world.

Notable infections

Deaths

Initial pandemic