Stories and anecdotes of the impact of the Great Pandemic in individual states were gathered for presentation at Pandemic Planning Summits held in each state. Go to this site and see what happened in YOUR state during the 1918 Pandemic.
http://www.pandemicflu.gov/general/grea ... c3.html#ok
Example:
Pennsylvania State Summit
Opening Remarks Prepared for Delivery
By the Honorable Mike Leavitt
Secretary of Health and Human Services
March 20, 2006
That Great Pandemic also touched Pennsylvania.
Earlier, I noted John Barry's description of what happened in Philadelphia. Let me give you a fuller picture now.
On September 27th, 1918 Pennsylvania optimistically reported that "comparatively few cases" had been reported among the civilian population. Then influenza took hold.
On October 4th, the state reported that the disease was epidemic in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Nearly 15,000 cases were counted in the first 18 days of October, and the dreadful toll continued to climb.
Philadelphia was one of the hardest hit cities in United States. As the disease spread, essential services collapsed. Nearly 500 policemen failed to report for duty. Firemen, garbage collectors, and city administrators fell ill.
The city's only morgue overflowed. It was built to handle 36 bodies, but contained more than 500. Bodies accumulated in the morgue's hallways and lay there rotting. Five supplementary morgues were eventually opened. Convicts were recruited to dig graves. There were never enough coffins, and people would steal them from undertakers when they could.
Public gatherings were banned to restrict the spread of the disease. Streetcars were shut down. Schools, churches, and places of public meeting were closed, and so were theaters and places of amusement.
The human cost was unbearable.
Selma Epp remembered her family's experience with the flu:
"[We] made up [our] own remedies, like castor oil [and] laxatives...everyone in our house grew weaker and weaker. Then my brother Daniel died. My aunt saw the horse-drawn wagon coming down the street. The strongest person in our family carried Daniel's body to the sidewalk. Everyone was too weak to protest. There were no coffins in the wagon, just bodies piled on top of each other. Daniel was two; he was just a little boy. They put his body on the wagon and took him away."
While the disease was raging in Philadelphia, some 50,000 people in Pittsburgh were being afflicted. So were thousands of others throughout the state.
Nearly 24,000 Pennsylvanians died during the first month of the disease. By October 25th, after the first wave of the pandemic had passed, it was estimated that 350,000 people had been struck with the flu (about 150,000 of whom were Philadelphians).
When it comes to pandemics, there is no rational basis to believe that the early years of the 21st century will be different than the past. If a pandemic strikes, it will come to Pennsylvania.
