Influenza Epidemic in Glasgow, 1918–19: Source, Impact and Response

Abstract

The emergence of Cov-19 in China in December 2019 has shown how vulnerable populations are to novel viruses. The influenza pandemic of 1918–19 was also caused by a novel virus which had crossed the species boundary and led to seventy million deaths world-wide. The historiography of the epidemic in Britain tends towards a national perspective with few regional studies. This article provides a regional perspective by studying the epidemic in Glasgow. The study will identify the likely source of initial infection and the impact of the disease and will also consider the public and the municipal health authority responses to the epidemic. Finally, there will be an assessment on whether this most fatal of diseases left a lasting legacy. It will be suggested that infection probably arrived on a transatlantic ship and that some 6,000 to 7,000 died comprising all age groups and across the social spectrum. The article will conclude that the influenza epidemic in Glasgow, in the context of the prevailing poor state of public health, was a serious, rather than a catastrophic, outbreak of disease and that it quickly receded in the public consciousness.