At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, surrounded by masked faces and terrifying headlines, it was easy to feel like we were living in a moment unlike any other. The world’s governments’ varied responses to crisis and the radical changes in our day-to-day lives seemed unprecedented, but, in fact, the world had already undergone this shift about a century before.
The 1918 flu pandemic, also known as the “Spanish flu,” took everyone by surprise with its deadly and fast-spreading disease. In total, it lasted about a year and infected an estimated 500 million people—about a quarter of the world's population at the time—and resulted in around 50 million deaths across the globe.
Curious? Click through to see what it was like to live through the 1918 flu.