Hunting an Invisible Killer

Science Vs

Spotify Studios

Science, Education, Health & Fitness

4.4 • 12.4K Ratings

🗓️ 2 October 2020

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

An adventuring Swedish doctor takes on a decades-long medical mystery: What exactly was the 1918 flu? We talk to Dr. Johan Hultin, Eileen Hultin, Dr. Jeffery Taubenberger, Ann Reid, Rita Olanna and Annie Conger. Here’s a link to our transcript: https://bit.ly/30mnvt6 Check out Radiolab’s episode on the 1918 flu here: https://bit.ly/3n9cxkm And the book Flu: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused it by Gina Kolata: https://bit.ly/3ipCeJU This episode was produced by Rose Rimler with help from Wendy Zukerman, along with Michelle Dang, Hannah Harris Green and Nicholas DelRose. We’re edited by Blythe Terrell. Fact checking by Eva Dasher. Mix and sound design by Peter Leonard. Music written by Peter Leonard, Bobby Lord, Emma Munger, and Marcus Thorne Bagala. Special thanks to: Abbie Ruzicka, Abigail Collins, Davis Hovey, John White, Robyn Russell, Rachel Cohen, Warren Kakoona, Brian Crockett, Trefon Angasan, Brad Angasan, Matt Ganley, Dr. Adam Lauring, Dr. Matt Memoli, Prof. Susan Jones, and everyone else we spoke to for this episode. Plus a big thanks to Brendan Klinkenberg, Walter Rimler, the Zukerman family and Joseph Lavelle Wilson. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Vestus from Gimlin.
0:04.6	Today on the show, the hunt for one of the biggest killers of the 20th century.
0:18.1	It's almost inconceivable how bad it was.
0:22.1	There are reports of people turning blue and getting this sort of like weird death-looking
0:28.2	face because they weren't getting enough oxygen.
0:30.8	That's producer Rose Rimmler, and we're talking about the 1918 flu.
0:35.2	It's estimated that it killed as many as 100 million people worldwide.
0:40.2	And while a lot of us have heard quite a lot about this flu, as Rose started researching
0:44.3	it, one thing that really surprised her was how little science knew about what was killing
0:50.0	people at the time.
0:52.0	They knew about flus, they had the word influenza, but they didn't know exactly what a virus
0:56.6	was because they didn't have microscopes.
0:58.7	I could see anything that small.
1:00.4	I just think about how much comfort I get from the fact that we know certain things about
1:08.3	the coronavirus.
1:10.2	Like we know how it enters the body, how it can attack the lungs.
1:16.6	We know it's a coronavirus.
1:18.6	I don't know.
1:19.6	I get comfort from that.
1:20.6	This idea that back then there was this invisible thing just sweeping through cities and killing
1:28.6	all these people, I feel like is terrifying to think about.
1:33.8	I agree.
	...

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