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Social History of Medicine 1991 4(2):277-294; doi:10.1093/shm/4.2.277
© 1991 by Society for the Social History of Medicine
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The Influenza Epidemic of 1918–1919 in France: Contemporary Concepts of Aetiology, Therapy, and Prevention

MARTHA L. HILDRETH*

*Department of History, University of Nevada Reno Nevada 89557, USA

SUMMARY During the great epidemic of 1918–1919 there was great disagreement among French microbiologists and epidemiologists about the exact means of transmission in influenza and over the nature of the infection itself. Aetiological controversy began soon after the 1889–90 epidemic and intensified during the course of the great pandemic.

In spite of scientific discord, physicians held to a general understanding of the nature of the disease, based upon the emerging concept of bacteriological infection, which allowed them to proceed with extensive therapeutic intervention. This understanding supported the use of traditional anti-fever therapies such as quinine and venesection, as well as new laboratory ant bacteriological chemotherapies, vaccines, and serums. On the side of prevention and containment, assumptions included the notion of contagion of place and of infected atmospheres as well as person to person contagion; the public health and nursing efforts against the epidemic reflected these beliefs.

The medical response to the great epidemic provides a useful way of examining the therapeutic perspective of the era and of revealing the relationship between aetiological concepts and therapeutic and prophylactic regimens. The laboratory was a powerful influence in the therapies of the era as a variety of new chemotherapies travelled quickly from the test tube into the bodies of influenza victims. A network of publications connected French physicians in the field with these latest scientific discoveries, serving to legitimate new therapies and put them quickly into medical practice alongside more traditional remedies.

Keywords: Influenza; French medicine; therapeutics; chemotherapy; antibiotics; contagion; miasma; aetiology; immunotherapy; epidemics


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