102 years ago, the last Christmas was experienced in a pandemic, when the Spanish flu caused more than 50 million deaths worldwide.
In 1919, Rebecca Tinti lived in rural Iowa with her young daughter, on her family’s farm. With the end of the year, winters get worse in this area of the United States. Around him, all his neighbors had fallen ill: everything indicated that he would live a Christmas in a pandemic, amid the global outbreaks of the Spanish flu, which claimed the lives of between 50 and 100 million people around the world.
Every day he heard about new people who had to rest. One day, as night approached, he found seven bedridden people (among which there was a baby of months), in the care of a girl her daughter’s age, about six years.
“Beware of the mistletoe”
Just one month earlier, on December 21, 1918, the Ohio State Journal posted in a warning alerting locals to flu pandemic. A statement from the acting state health commissioner made the front page: «Beware of mistletoe«. In the text, readers were invited to skip their Christmas dinners and crowded gatherings, to prevent infections from increasing.
Still healthy, Rebecca Trinti decided to help the community offering them his home as a healing center. However, he could not avoid the tragedy, as he recounted in his own handwriting in a letter dated January of that year:
“The man had been waiting for the rest until he had a relapse and continued to get worse, until he died a week later. I stayed until the funeral, which was the day before Christmas. “
All letters written by Rebecca Tinti are now in the hands of her goddaughter’s daughter, Ruth M. Lux, 72, who still resides in the same rural Iowa community.
The Christmas closure of a century ago
By the fall of 1918, the Spanish flu pandemic had already peaked in United States. The flu took high bills. There is a record that, by December of that year, he ended the life of more than 675 thousand people.
Considering the population density at the time, it was a more than alarming figure for the country’s authorities. The end of the health crisis was not in sight, by any means. Even less for the cold winter, which predicted a third wave of infections.
Around Christmas, very restrictive lockdown measures were taken to prevent more people from getting infected during the winter. At that time, he assures Howard Markel, director of the Center for the History of Medicine at the University of Michigan School of Medicine, the relationship of people with the disease was not distant.
Rather, they came from a generation of significant losses (of children, parents, relatives and friends) because of some discomfort for which there was no cure. Those who had suffered a near death from polio were willing to confine themselves as long as necessary, so they prepared to limit your activities and social encounters to a minimum.
The statement, then, was effective: at first, with the significant number of infections that there were, the local government had to send a statement official to alert people to the risks of coming into contact with other people. Even more so with cold winter, which made the population more vulnerable. Finally, with this awareness, the people were confined for the December holidays, and infections dropped significantly.
The anxiety to meet for the holidays in 1918 had to wait, as it will have to be this time. However, people back then understood the gravity of the situation. The fact that measures to prevent further contagion were taken into account greatly contributed to the flu infection rate decreased. Perhaps this is something worth taking seriously today, while we spent Christmas in pandemic.
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