More people died in the 1918–1919 influenza pandemic or “Spanish Flu” than in any other pandemic, war, or famine in history—50 to 100 million of the world’s 1.8 billion people died in sixteen weeks, from mid-September to mid-December of 1918. 675, 000 perished in the United States alone - more than in the US Civil War. The flu originated in January 1918 in Haskell County, Kansas. It spread to the army barracks of Camp Funston, now Ft. Riley, located three hundred miles to the east of Haskell County. Nine months earlier, on April 6, 1917, the United States had entered World War I with devastating consequences on the pandemic. Scientists were surprised that the black population, which was expected to fare poorly, had lower morbidity and mortality than the white population during the autumn of 1918. How did these experts and the Harlem Blues finally explain this apparent inconsistency? What lessons can the black population draw from the 1918 pandemic to protect itself during the Covid-19 pandemic?
Dr. Gnimbin A. Ouattara is a Fulbright scholar from Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast), West Africa. He is currently an Associate Professor of History and International Studies at Brenau University. He received his PhD in African History from Georgia State University in 2007. His published and unpublished research compares the work of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions in the Cherokee Nation and West Africa within the contexts of the Atlantic slavery and the Western civilizing missions. He is also a Georgia State University Film School graduate, specializing in historical documentary filmmaking. His last film, published in 2016, is titled, Ali Mbomayé, a documentary that recounts for the first time the African perspective on the famous Muhammad Ali vs George Foreman Heavyweight title bout in 1974.
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TAGS: | Education | Culture | Community Event |
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