meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
Throughline

1918 Flu

Throughline

NPR

Society & Culture, History, Documentary

4.715K Ratings

🗓️ 26 March 2020

⏱️ 38 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic it's tempting to draw comparisons to the most severe pandemic in recent history - the 1918 flu. But as much as we can learn from the comparison, it's important to also understand just how much these two pandemics differ. This week, what we can learn from what happened then and, just as importantly, where the comparison should end.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Hey, I'm Rhonda Bddvittach.

0:02.5

I'm Romteen Arablui.

0:04.1

And on this episode of Thurline from NPR, the 1918 Flu Pandemic.

0:10.0

Well, what can we say?

0:18.6

Here we are in the middle of a global pandemic.

0:22.0

And many of us, including the entire Thurline team, have been working remotely from home

0:27.4

for over a week now, trying to practice social distancing.

0:31.5

But of course, this isn't the first pandemic in history.

0:35.4

Many of you have probably heard comparisons being made between what's happening today and

0:39.4

the 1918 Flu Pandemic, sometimes called the Spanish Flu.

0:44.6

It was a novel virus, novel meaning never before seen in humans, that swept across the globe,

0:51.5

infecting roughly one-third of the entire population.

0:55.2

And I think while we have some comparison, some similarities between what happened then

1:00.0

and what happened now, there are of course huge differences in our understanding of the

1:04.7

virus, our treatments of it and other things.

1:07.2

And I think that story is also worth telling.

1:10.0

This is Jeremy Brown.

1:11.6

I'm an emergency physician and I'm the author of the book Influenza, the 100-year hunt

1:17.1

to cure the deadliest disease in history.

1:19.6

And I also work at the National Institutes of Health, where I am the director of the Office

1:24.6

of Emergency Care Research.

1:26.5

Jeremy talked to us as a private citizen, not as a representative of the NIH or the federal

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from NPR, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of NPR and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.