History of influenza

In March of 1918, American soldiers training in Camp Function, Kansas, suddenly came down with a particular strong strain of the flu.

Many of those who got sick, contracted pneumonia because their bodies were so weak from having been so ill.

The term influenza stems for the Latin word influere, which means ‘flowing into’ or ‘creeping into’. People in fifteenth-century Italy thought the sickness was caused by the ‘influence’ of the stars, so they named it ‘influenza’.

During 3000 BC to 2000 BC, influenza first time capable of infecting humans. It probably arises in central Asia.

The earliest descriptions of influenza are commonly attributed to Hippocrates. In the writings of Hippocrates in 412 BC there is a description of an epidemic in North Greece with symptoms similar to influenza.

Roman historian Livy who lived between 59 BC and 17 AD described a flu-like disease that attacked the Roman army and the enemy soldiers they were fighting.

Between 1781 and 1782, an influenza pandemic infected two-thirds of Rome’s population and three-fourths of Britain’s population. The disease continued to spread in North America, the West Indies and South America.

The spread of this pandemic culminated with an influenza epidemic in New England, New York and Nova Scotia in 1789.

While influenza has afflicted humans for centuries, it has been claimed that it was in the nineteenth century that influenza became an endemic, disease in the majority of the countries in the world, regularly producing large epidemic and pandemics. The first worldwide pandemic of influenza happened in 1833.

In 1940 the influenza B virus was isolated and the influenza C virus in 1949. Since 1945, an active influenza vaccination has been available.
History of influenza