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  • 2020-03-31 (xsd:date)
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  • Did Cities Close Schools, Businesses During the 1918 Pandemic? (en)
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  • In March 2020, as cities around the world announced shelter-in-place or self-quarantine orders in an effort to reduce the spread of COVID-19, social media users started to circulate an image that supposedly showed a newspaper clipping from 1918 with a similar announcement in the town of Kelowna, British Columbia: The clipping reads: This is a genuine newspaper clipping that was published in the Kelowna Record in 1918 as this Canadian town, as well as the rest of the world, fought to prevent the spread of the H1N1 virus, commonly and misleadingly called the Spanish Flu. The clipping was archived by the University of British Columbia and can be viewed here. Kelowna, of course, was not the only city to issue such an order. We searched the archives of Newspapers.com and found several similar announcements in cities across the United States. On Oct. 10, 1918, for instance, Des Moines, Iowa, Mayor Thomas P. Fairweather announced that in order to prevent the spread of Spanish Influenza and to protect the public health and safety, he was directing all public places of amusement, including theaters, moving pictures houses, dance halls and public dancing places, pool and billiard halls, skating rinks, outdoor athletic events, all public congregating places subject to unusual congestion, be closed. Thu, Oct 10, 1918 – Page 6 · The Des Moines Register (Des Moines, Iowa) · Newspapers.com Mobile, Alabama, took these closures one step further. In addition to closing restaurants and businesses, Mobile also asked people to refrain from kissing: Tue, Oct 8, 1918 – 10 · Knoxville Sentinel (Knoxville, Tennessee) · Newspapers.com In 1918, just like today, individual cities and states made the decision to close schools, businesses, and public gathering places. According to a recent study from the Journal of the American Society of Cytopathology, cities that implemented strict social guidelines during the early days of the 1918 pandemic saw lower transmission rates and reduced total mortalities. National Geographic saw a similar pattern when it looked at the total deaths during the 1918 pandemic in various cities in the U.S. Philadelphia, for instance, held a large parade a few days after its first H1N1 death and saw a major spike in deaths. St. Louis, on the other hand, implemented social-distancing measures early on and managed to delay its mortality peak: In short, the 1918 newspaper clipping from Kelowna, British Columbia, that announced the closures of schools, businesses, and other public places during the H1N1 pandemic is real, but not unique. Similar announcements were made in a variety of cities in an attempt to slow the spread of the Spanish flu. (en)
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