Studies on Epidemic Influenza: Comprising Clinical and Laboratory InvestigationsUniversity of Pittsburgh. School of Medicine
History
Studies on Epidemic Influenza: Comprising Clinical and Laboratory Investigations
University of Pittsburgh. School of Medicine
Influenza; Influenza Epidemic, 1918-1919
A young married farmer living in a rural community where no influenza
had occurred up to the time of the present experience went to a city
about 40 miles distant. On the train he sat in the same seat with a man
who was apparently ill, and who was sneezing and coughing. He was in the
city only a few hours, and was not in any place of congregation except
the railway train. Forty-eight hours after his return to his home he
noticed the first symptoms and began a mild course of influenza. About
50 hours later his wife was taken with the same symptoms, and in two
days more their only child was afflicted. Other members of the household
were also afflicted, and one of them died of pneumonia.
It might be interesting to quote a similar observation made by Macdonald
and Lyth, of York, England, published in a recent issue of the British
Medical Journal (November 2, 1918, p. 488), which corroborates this
experience. They say: “We traveled from London together on Thursday,
October 3, by train, leaving King’s Cross at 5.30 P. M., arriving in
York at 9.30, and as we were leaving the carriage a young flying
officer, who had come the whole way with us and was coughing and
sneezing at intervals, informed us that he was ill and had had influenza
for several days. On Saturday, October 5, we both became ill and had
developed typical attacks of influenza. With both of us the illness
developed suddenly with laryngitis; in both the first signs were a
severe attack of coughing; and in both the time was noted fairly
accurately as being between 2 and 2.30 P. M. One case was quite mild,
the temperature never over 101. The other was more severe; the
temperature arose to 104½ and the catarrh extended to the bronchi. His
wife and two children also developed influenza, and in their case the
symptoms showed suddenly, about 2 P. M., on Monday, October 7. Now we
are convinced that we became infected from our traveling companion
during the train journey—more likely toward the end of the journey; and
if we take the time of infection as 9.30, this fixes the incubation
period for both of us at a minimum of 41 hours, with a maximum margin of
error of 4 hours. The three cases developing in the family of one of us
point to a similar incubation period, as their illness started almost
exactly 48 hours after his, and as it is likely that the infection would
not take place until a few hours after the first symptom, the incubation
period in these three cases must have been nearly the same as our own
two.
“It can be readily understood that we were in no position to conduct
extensive bacteriological examinations, but a culture taken from the
posterior nares of one of us on October 10 with a guarded swab showed
colonies of Pfeiffer’s bacillus and of micrococcus catarrhalis.”
This observation is so convincing, I have quoted it at length and in
full.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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