Talk:Spanish flu/Archive 4

Is Spanish flu virus no more aggressive than ordinary flu?
"Scientists offer several possible explanations for the high mortality rate of the 1918 influenza pandemic. Some analyses have shown the virus to be particularly deadly because it triggers a cytokine storm, which ravages the stronger immune system of young adults.[7] In contrast, a 2007 analysis of medical journals from the period of the pandemic found that the viral infection was no more aggressive than previous influenza strains.[8][9] Instead, malnourishment, overcrowded medical camps and hospitals, and poor hygiene, all exacerbated by the recent war, promoted bacterial superinfection. This superinfection killed most of the victims, typically after a somewhat prolonged death bed.[10][11]"

Concerning this sentence and the following two sentences: "In contrast, a 2007 analysis of medical journals from the period of the pandemic found that the viral infection was no more aggressive than previous influenza strains.[8][9]"

I wonder if this is true. Is there a source for the 2007 analysis? Some who died around the world were apparently not directly affected by these wartime hardships, and were in good health before being precipitously felled by this flu. Look at this article, which gives an example of women playing cards and dying overnight:
 * https://virus.stanford.edu/uda

I looked briefly at the two references given [8][9], which are medical journal articles from 1919 describing the pathology of the Spanish flu, but did not immediately see them declare that this was no more virulent than ordinary flu. On the contrary, accounts I have read describe a grim and rapid deterioration that does not sound like the ordinary flu.
 * https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-i/1918-flu-pandemic
 * https://www.history.com/news/spanish-flu-second-wave-resurgence

These last two sources mention a mutated virus that was especially deadly to victims of the second wave of the pandemic, in the fall of 2018. I am not a pathologist, so I may have missed something in the medical journal articles – it would be nice to have an expert comment on them in this discussion blog.

It's possible that the mere fact of the Spanish flu being more contagious than the ordinary flu (if that is true) combined with wartime hardships led to an overwhelming of the healthcare system and more death from associated causes. I wonder if there are previous and later accounts of death by ordinary flu among susceptible populations, and with possible deficiencies in healthcare provision, that match those described for Spanish flu.

I just found this article saying a 2008 study of Spanish flu tissue samples show that a majority died of bacterial infections occurring after infection by the flu virus.
 * https://academic.oup.com/jid/article/198/7/962/2192118

But this does not mean that the virus was less virulent. That's like saying it was really lack of oxygen (hypoxia) that killed the victim of a gunshot wound, not the bullet. Deardavid7 (talk) 08:16, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

Economic Effects of the 1918 Influenza Pandemic

 * 24.7.104.84 (talk) 22:00, 23 November 2020 (UTC)
 * 24.7.104.84 (talk) 22:00, 23 November 2020 (UTC)

Do we...
add details on the COVID-19 pandemic in the Spanish flu header? Marc Raphael Felix (talk) 10:25, 25 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, when we have the numbers. In about ten years from now, for a guess? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 10:45, 25 November 2020 (UTC)

Is this answerable?
(Are the answers on another wiki page?)

How did the epidemic subside?

Did susceptible (humans) die out; or did the world develop immunity?

Did the virus attenuate?

Does the virus still exist in the population (in 2020); (if so) how much; and is it still as deadly?

MBG02 (talk) 13:56, 7 December 2020 (UTC)


 * See Talk:Spanish_flu above. It is hard to give exact answers to these questions, but after 1920 the virus is believed to have mutated into less virulent forms that are still around today.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 14:14, 7 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I posted that before I searched Google.
 * There's a bit here: (amp.abc.net.au/article/12596954) and other sites.
 * Worth including? https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-i/1918-flu-pandemic says: In 2008, researchers announced what made the 1918 flu so deadly: a group of three genes [...] that cleared the way for bacterial pneumonia.
 * I was expecting there'd be (easily understood) textbooks on it: especially the “herd immunity” and “attenuation” aspects. And that that would be (mentioned and summarised) in this article.
 * MBG02 (talk) 17:29, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
 * I was expecting there'd be (easily understood) textbooks on it: especially the “herd immunity” and “attenuation” aspects. And that that would be (mentioned and summarised) in this article.
 * MBG02 (talk) 17:29, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

Covid-19 comparison
Given the current situation, many of us would be wondering about past pandemics. A comparison to the SARS-cov-2 virus outbreak this year may be an idea as an addition to the table comparing the 1918 pandemic to various other coronavirus outbreaks. Mr anonymous username (talk) 20:08, 7 December 2020 (UTC)


 * See the thread Talk:Spanish_flu above. It's too early to make exact comparisons between Covid-19 and other pandemics, but the article COVID-19 pandemic death rates by country has up to date figures for death rates in different countries, which vary considerably.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 22:59, 7 December 2020 (UTC)


 * PS: Some other factors (in spike, then subsidence); weakened population due to War; crowding (civilians and military); and over-use (overdosing) of (the newly created) aspirin.
 * The 1st is in this article; 2nd is alluded to; and the 3rd is not here (but is on google). MBG02 (talk) 15:21, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

US Deaths in final four months of 1918 misleading
Under History- Deadly Second Wave, the cited CDC report, ref 37, only has deaths for "Registered" states, only 24 of the 48 states in the union at that time. See page 10 of the cited article for discussion of which states were registered. Of the 30 registered, only the 24 were used in the table for the other 6 didn't have comparable historic information. Not sure if there is a more accurate number of if the citation should be contextualized to 24 states. 18:01, 9 December 2020 (UTC)74.62.128.66 (talk)

Edit request on police state and liberal fascism
Remove “Liberal Fascist state under the presidency of Woodrow Wilson” in the “American Flu” subsection 2603:6010:E742:1F00:F3:2E6E:DFE8:2114 (talk) 03:01, 21 December 2020 (UTC)
 * I was looking at this too. The link to the book Liberal Fascism doesn't seem appropriate for the context, and describing the US during WWI as a fascist state seems like a stretch. Eric684 (talk) 03:30, 21 December 2020 (UTC)
 * That change was made just today. The previous wording used the same Wikilink (to Liberal Fascism) to describe Wilson's approach as a police state. It is well sourced. Which wording do you prefer? HiLo48 (talk) 03:33, 21 December 2020 (UTC)

Let's be careful here, part (or most?) of the description of the US under Wilson ("liberal fascism" and "police state") came from a piece in The Spectator, which the WP Reliable Sources Noticeboard list describes as an editorial/opinion publication: I'm not at all sure information obtained solely from it can be considered reliably sourced. I'm wondering if the entire addition can be allowed to remain. &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 05:05, 21 December 2020 (UTC)
 * I remove the Liberal Fascism commentary since it is not entirely necessary for the point it is making. With the help of two more sources, I rewrote the police state commentary. Lovewhatyoudo (talk) 06:44, 21 December 2020 (UTC)
 * I have reverted this addition consisting of low-quality op-eds and polemics as a tendentious WP:COATRACK largely unrelated to coverage of the 1918–1919 pandemic in academic sources and medical journals. Lovewhatyoudo should familiarize himself with Wikipedia's content policies and sourcing guidelines, rather than scraping the bottom of the barrel with The Spectator (a conservative-leaning opinion tabloid), a blogpost from the Mises Institute (a fringe libertarian think tank), and even World Travel Market (which appears to lack notability and was likely selected because it was one of the only results that came up when Lovewhatyoudo googled "American flu," his newly-created redirect for this article). All of Lovewhatyoudo's sources are opinion articles of some variety or another, all are dated 2020, and not one is authored by a subject-matter expert (except presumably the University of Michigan source, but that seems to be misrepresented and is not used to support any of the main claims in the section); these sources are primarily focused on the COVID-19 pandemic and are using the dispute over the origins and name of the "Spanish flu" to make political arguments regarding the current pandemic. Now, Max Boot may very well be right to say that "Trump can't blame China for his own coronavirus failures," to quote the title of one of the more reputable op-eds produced by Lovewhatyoudo, but that is not the type of sourcing that should be featured so prominently in this article. I would advise against reinstating this disputed content absent a clear consensus for inclusion.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 08:16, 21 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Criticism accepted. Complete overhaul of sourcing and relocate selected sentences to more relevant paragraphs on US responses rather than on etymology. --  love.wh  11:08, 21 December 2020 (UTC)


 * I agree with that this article is a discussion of a flu pandemic over a century ago, and while there are some parallels to current political machinations going on, the info you're attempting to insert seems a bit POV. I am also trying to be really cautious about this article, since (see the top of the Talk page) discretionary sanctions are in effect (for exactly these reasons). This article doesn't need to be colored by Trump, any American political party, or the current response to the COVID-19 pandemic (or lack thereof), so let's discuss your proposed changes here, first. Cheers! &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 00:23, 22 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Your revert on American flu's etymology led to "collateral damage" on the paragraph on the US response (Under "Response" paragraph) which mostly citing professional history sources in 2005 and before. As you have mentioned no issues regarding that paragraph, I will put it back. -- love.wh  00:39, 22 December 2020 (UTC)


 * No, there was no collateral damage; my revert restored the original text which, as I mentioned above, was my intent. Please discuss your proposed additions here before changing the article text. &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 03:14, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Sourcing on the claim
Here is proposed sourcing of the police state claim in question. -- love.wh  03:33, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

The Sedition Act of 1918 made it punishable by 20 years in jail to “utter, print, write or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the government of the United States”, hence few people contradict the official line on pandemic control. All in all, the Wilson administration response was characterized as a police state.


 * "...a virtual police state..." and "...the closest the US ever came to becoming a full police state..." are still NOT a police state. While I agree that the Wilson administration definitely pushed the US in an authoritarianism direction during the war, characterizing it as a "police state" seems like unnecessary rhetoric for this article. Eric684 (talk) 16:07, 22 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Not only is this content lacking support from multiple high-quality reliable sources, but also the very notion that the U.S. adopted "police state" measures during World War I smacks of a POV WP:COATRACK at best only tangentially relevant to this article.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 18:36, 22 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Your objection to the sourcing of the claim is well founded. Besides, that claim is indeed not at all necessary for the point it is trying to make. The claim should not be reinstated. -- love.wh  01:47, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

First draft
I propose to add a separated paragraph on the response of the US media and the authorities under a new subheading "Wartime censorship" under the current section "Response". -- love.wh  03:33, 22 December 2020 (UTC) When it first appeared, officials routinely insisted it was only ordinary influenza; as the epidemic exploded, officials almost daily assured the public that the worst was over. In 1918, John Dill Robertson, the Chicago Public Health Commissioner said, “It is our duty to keep the people from fear. Worry kills more people than the epidemic.” Newspapers across the US pushed out similar messages like “Don’t Panic” and “Don’t Let Flu Frighten You to Death”. In 1917, Senator Hiram Johnson (R-Cal.) made the since-famous observation that “The first casualty when war comes is truth.” The false reassurances given by the authorities and the press destroyed trust, "they were assisted—not challenged—by the press, which although not censored in a technical sense cooperated fully with the government's propaganda machine”, The Wilson administration used the pandemic as a justification for the continued US censorship at her home front during World War I lest it be seen as unpatriotic or to be undermining the US home front. The Sedition Act of 1918 punished up to 20 years in jail if one “utter, print, write or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the government of the United States”, hence few people contradict the official line on pandemic control.


 * Some thoughts:
 * The word "exploded" is hyperbole; something like "expanded" or "accelerated" would be much more encyclopedic (and accurate).
 * After reviewing several pieces published by The Spectator, I see why there is a cautionary note on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard list. Just because the contributor feels that the disease should be renamed "American Flu" doesn't mean the opinion should be published in an encyclopedia. The reference from The Spectator does not belong in this article.
 * "Destroyed trust" is a pretty sweeping statement. As written (without a modifier), it's telling the reader that ALL trust was destroyed. I don't believe that for a second. How about "damaged citizens' trust in Public Health authorities" (assuming you can find a reliable source for that)?
 * You misstated the penalty section of the so-called Sedition Act. The law provides for fines and confinement up to 20 years.
 * The statement "the US almost slid into authoritarianism" is pretty sweeping. Granted, Wilson did lean that way, but was the risk really that high?
 * Remember that this is an encyclopedia, not a newspaper or tabloid. We need to report the facts ("Disease X is contagious and has resulted in death in 2.6% of the patients contracting it. So far, research indicates it spreads more rapidly than the common cold, but not as quickly as SARS."), as opposed to drawing conclusions about them ("Disease X spreads from person to person like wildfire, resulting in gruesome deaths everywhere it goes, and airborne spread means that it's going everywhere!").
 * A while back, I read something in a Wikipedia essay that stuck with me because it's proven true time after time: "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary sourcing." I think most—if not all—these suggested additions fall under that umbrella. &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 17:44, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

Second draft

 * I've taken into account the comments of above and produce a second draft, which is entirely a direct rewrite of  (a US medical professor's account presented at the Institute of Medicine), supplemented by  (himself a chair of advisors of a UK health agency). All your concerns in the renditioning are direct wording from these two professionals. I overhaul the footnotes for everyone interested to check out the quotes. When multiple citations are offered for the same sentence, always check against  first.
 * I propose the following to be added as a separated heading "United States" under a new subheading "Wartime response and censorship" under the current section "Response".
 * <U>Chief source (US):</U>
 * <U>Supplementary source (UK):</U>
 * -- love.wh  04:08, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

In Autumn 1918, during World War I, there have been calls to stop US troopships to France until the epidemic ended as the troops were getting infected during voyage. "It is impossible to state how many soldiers the ocean voyages killed, especially when one tries to count those infected aboard ship who died later on shore," however, the call to stop the shipment failed upon the repeated objection of Peyton March, the US Army Chief of Staff, against the urge of acting army surgeon general Charles Richard and against the concern of President Woodrow Wilson.

To avoid damaging morale and the U.S. effort at her home front during World War I, local officials almost universally told half-truths or outright lies regarding the epidemic. When it first appeared, officials routinely insisted it was only ordinary influenza; as the epidemic accelerated, officials almost daily assured the public that the worst was over. The idea “fear kills more than the disease” became a slogan put forward by the authorities and the media in cities nationwide, with such views most notably uttered by John Dill Robertson, the Chicago Public Health Commissioner. The false reassurances given by the authorities and the self-censored press systematically destroyed trust, “they were assisted—not challenged—by the press, which although not censored in a technical sense cooperated fully with the government's propaganda machine” (i.e. Committee on Public Information, CPI). Few people contradicted the official line on epidemic control, with a prominent reason being the rigid control imposed by the CPI and the newly passed Sedition Act of 1918, which punished up to 20 years in jail if one “utter, print, write or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the government of the United States”.

Rewrite the role of WWI in etymology
I proposed to rewrite the role of WWI in etymology paragraph. I am glad to have found a much needed Spanish academic voice on etymology. -- love.wh  03:33, 22 December 2020 (UTC) To avoid hurting morale, the press in countries fighting in the World War I did not mention the outbreak even in the nonlethal first wave. Spain was not at war and therefore its press was free to report the illness there, so the pandemic became known as the Spanish flu. Widely-spread stories of the grave illness of King Alfonso XIII in particular created a false impression of Spain as especially hard hit. "American flu" was first used by French journalists as the virus' origin was believed (and still now) to be American solders, but the French phased out the term after being advised it would hamper the US-France alliance in WWI.


 * Most of this looks to me to be rehashing info already included in the section, with the exception of the last sentence. I would support its addition to the article since there currently is no mention of the French use of the term "American Flu". However, I would suggest leaving out the "...(and still now...)" portion since the actual origin of the virus has yet to be conclusively determined, and IMO this gives undue weight to the American source theory. Eric684 (talk) 17:45, 24 December 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 30 December 2020
Please remove the term waves, viruses do not come in 'waves'. As per this paper written in April. https://www.cebm.net/covid-19/covid-19-epidemic-waves/ Jobrads (talk) 17:59, 30 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Wikipedia articles reflect the terms used in reliable sources. The terms "first wave" and "second wave" are commonly used, eg here on CNN. Also, per WP:MEDRS, it doesn't help that the cite given above has a footnote saying "Disclaimer: the article has not been peer-reviewed; it should not replace individual clinical judgement and the sources cited should be checked. The views expressed in this commentary represent the views of the authors and not necessarily those of the host institution."-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 18:21, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 January 2021
Calling the 1918 pandemic the "Spanish flu" in plain XXI century is comical. This should be renamed as the "1918 Influenza pandemic, wrongly named Spanish Flu." 83.58.171.203 (talk) 12:21, 6 January 2021 (UTC)


 * Please see Talk:Spanish_flu/Archive_3 and the various other talk page discussions about this. Page names can usually only be changed with a consensus after a discussion.- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 12:37, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

Camp Greene?
The lead states that the disease was seen "months earlier at Camp Greene", but the body contains no text whatever about Camp Greene, let alone more details. The cited source is privately published, making it little better than WP:OR and not a WP:reliable source, so for now I have tagged it as and. Is there any convincing reason why this statement should not be deleted? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:43, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

Compare that to a far more convincingly cited statement in the body (in #First wave of early 1918): "The disease had been observed in Haskell County, Kansas in January 1918, prompting local doctor Loring Miner to warn the US Public Health Service's academic journal." I'm even more convinced that we should delete the Camp Greene reference. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:52, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

The dubious content continues: the text "The first observations of illness and mortality were documented in the United States (in Kansas and New York City, " conflicts with cited text in #Second wave that says that NYC saw its first fatality in September. Something seriously amiss here. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 16:00, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

WP:LEAD says that the lead should summarise body content. We have a whole section, #Potential origins, which contains properly cited studies about its potential origin, which is not reflected in the lead. Instead we have dubiously cited content that is not reflective of the body. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 16:12, 8 January 2021 (UTC)
 * This content was added to the lede last November by the author of the self-published book in question, Santiago Mata, using his (rarely-active) single-purpose account User:Centroeuropa, which previously cited Mata's own self-published website to make a similar claim, apparently as part of a nationalistic effort to avenge Spain's honor which has been tarnished by the (admittedly erroneous) English-language common name "Spanish flu." Apart from all of the other issues with the source, an author highlighting his own self-published research as especially significant in the lede of a highly-visible article raises legitimate conflict of interest concerns. Accordingly, and in line with John Maynard Friedman's observations above, I have removed this content from the lede.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 20:27, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

film: by Andrew Thompson (dir): The Flu That killed 50 Million.
GB, bbc, 2018, documentation, 49 Min.


 * imdb - original, engl. Version, 49 min.

Cast & Crew

Wendy Barclay - as Herself, professor, Imperial College London

Catharine Arnold - Herself, author of "Pandemic 1918: The Story of the Deadliest Influenza in History"

Mark Harrison - Himself, professor, University of Oxford

Mark Honigsbaum - Himself, lecturer at City University of London

Michael Bresalier - Himself, lecturer in the history of medicine, Swansea University

Paul Birchard as William Welch

Iain Davie ~ Ernest Gibson

Jeremy Edwards - Basil Hood

Kenny Fullwood ~ Alexander Jamieson

Amy Kennedy ~ Katherine Garvin

Hannah MacPhail ~ Ada Berry

Isabel McClelland ~ Mary Dobson

Brian Pettifer ~ Victor Vaughan

Allan Tall - James Niven

Anita Vettesse ~ Catherine MacFie

Finlay Welsh ~ Arthur Newsholme

Christopher McPhillips ~ Doctor's Auxiliary

Production: Richard Bright, Andrew Thompson (director)

Kamera: Tom Hayward

Quousqueta (talk) 00:47, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

"it attacked the socioeconomic status of people"
I find this sentence a bit confusing: "The influenza did not discriminate who was infected, indeed it attacked the socioeconomic status of people." Should it say e.g. "discriminate in who was infected"? What does it mean "it attacked the socioeconomic status of people"? It's also not great that two sentences in that section start with "But, [...]", it being suboptimal to start a sentence with a conjunction and weirder to then add a comma. (However, changing "but" to "however" would resolve that.) -sche (talk) 05:27, 3 March 2021 (UTC)


 * It's a rather woolly and unencyclopedic phrase sourced here. The whole Newfoundland section is based on this source. The standard of the prose throughout this section isn't very good and needs tidying up.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 07:47, 3 March 2021 (UTC)


 * By the way, full access to this source about Newfoundland has a WP:PAYWALL, so it requires at least $16 to read it in full. This isn't ideal, as I wanted to read the cite to check for accuracy, but can't as I'm not paying for it.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 11:50, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

RfC COVID-19 comparison
I also think that a comparison to the SARS-COV-2 virus outbreak is valuable and it will be appreciated by our readers. So I propose to add the following sentence to Comparison with other pandemics section. The numbers will be updated automatically, as it does in Covid article :
 * The COVID-19 pandemic, as of, has left more than cases, with more than  deaths.

We could use WHO's COVID website as a source for the citation. What do you think ? Alexcalamaro (talk) 07:09, 20 February 2021 (UTC)
 * No opposition to my proposal, so I go ahead. Alexcalamaro (talk) 12:46, 27 February 2021 (UTC)


 * That section seems a bit WP:OFFTOPIC and disorganised / unclear — it just isn’t about the Spanish Flu, so why are these bits here? It seems an ad hoc random pick of disease outbreaks thru history without apparent basis of selections nor reason to be here.   I’d think it better to delete the section added at the end of June 2020.  Cheers Markbassett (talk) 07:46, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Hi . Maybe you are right and this section it is a bit WP:OFFTOPIC, so I would not strongly oppose its deletion. But when I was reading the article for the first time I found the section interesting and useful, specially to put that pandemic in perspective. Could be a good idea to gather more opinions before deleting it... Alexcalamaro (talk) 15:20, 21 March 2021 (UTC)
 * The disorganised / unclear nature of going offtopic seems where the section is becoming a problem, it seems an incomplete and/or undefined table with random side remarks. If the intent were stated in article that might correct it, or we can just delete it as not useful to the topic.  Currently many epidemics are in a table which has no lead text explaining why it’s here or what it is other than whataboutism and then a couple have now been put not in table but instead narrative place of prominence as lead text.  If instead there was lead text saying ‘for comparison, here are the major flu outbreaks in history’ or ‘here are the other major diseases of the 19th and 20th century’ that would define why the table is here and what belongs.   Otherwise, if this is just to compare to others and play which disease is worse ... That’s a wider topic comparison and I note many other epidemics are missing, both recent flu outbreaks and large non-flu epidemics.   e.g. smallpox exterminating first nations.   So ... it is mildly interesting, but seems something to remove or fix.  Cheers Markbassett (talk) 12:09, 25 March 2021 (UTC)
 * , after thinking a little more, I must agree with you: if we keep adding other pandemics (as smallpox) the section will grow to infinite. So I think the best is keep it within the boundaries of flu diseases. I have deleted propose to delete the other pandemics and left only the flu related, with a brief introductory phrase. Alexcalamaro (talk) 07:35, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 April 2021
The estimate death toll is shown as ~500 million, whereas in the given source they state those numbers to be ~50 million. 87.196.72.203 (talk) 23:35, 12 April 2021 (UTC)
 * The infobox says that there were 500 cases, not 500 fatalities, and that matches what the source says. RudolfRed (talk) 01:50, 13 April 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 April 2021
Hi, today we are living in a crusade against racism of any kind. BlackLivesMatter and StopAsianHate are common words of those of us that do defend everyone as equal and discrimination because of skin colour, religion, look or nationality or country of origin isn´t accepted in today´s world. The pandemic COVID-19 showed that even racism can get into a virus by some bigoted people like the ex-president Trump and many others calling this virus "Chinese virus". It creates a seed of hate for no reason, it is racist and discriminatory and simply unacceptable. It stigmatizes a population with the name of the country by associating it to the virus. On that same token, I have to say that as a European, a citizen of Spain; the Spanish flu creates the same unacceptable racist sentiment with even a worse identification. The nationals of that country "Spanish" in the name of something as bad as a virus. Not only it didn't originate in Spain but in the US and was discovered in Europe prior in countries like the UK and France, but because Spain never participated in any of the WW, by virtue of being neutral; when the King of Spain got the Influenza and made it to the papers all countries miserably jumped to name that pandemic after the nationals of Spain. The fact that Wikipedia article explains that "kind-of" very deep in the article (which not everyone gets that far to find the truth) doesn't make it right to continue to name Influenza "The Spanish Flu".

Instead, I propose "Influenza Pandemic 1918" and in parenthesis (aka The Spanish Flu). This will make the search of the article be more targeted to the virus itself without having to put the nationality of a country together with the name of a virus. Right now the way it is, is derogatory. I do know that a lot of sources and books written (we don´t know if they can be called -in-good-faith) still call this wrongly but If movements BlackLivesMatter and StopAsianHate are here to change things for the better any other racism or probability of using it against certain collective also needs to be corrected. Racism is wrong, including in the case of people from Spain. I am sure Wikipedia shares these values as well.

Because remember that if we accept that the virus wasn´t Chinese, there cannot be something called Spanish flu. Jonbra (talk) 16:29, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the template. Please get consensus for an edit before you request it. We name articles based on the WP:CommonName. Thanks. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:38, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Please read WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. We are not here to correct great wrongs. Wikipedia reports on the current status; it doesn't attempt to change the status. Wikipedia will not change the name of the flu until the reliable sources do so. Binksternet (talk) 16:41, 21 April 2021 (UTC)


 * This has been discussed various times, see the talk page archive and Talk:Spanish_flu above.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 17:25, 21 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I think that this will evolve over time. Although Spanish flu is the WP:COMMONNAME, that policy also states Editors should also consider all five of the criteria for article titles ... These criteria are recognizability, naturalness, precision, conciseness, & consistency. I would argue that the current article title is inconsistent with naming conventions. For instance, German measles redirects to Rubella, Spanish pox redirects to Syphilis, & Chinese coronavirus redirects to a disambiguation page that links to the more medically accurate article names. Yes, one can cite multiple geographic eponyms, but as of 2015, the World Health Organization issued guidelines discouraging the naming of diseases after "geographic locations", "people’s names", "species/class of animal or food", "cultural, population, industry or occupational references" or "terms that incite undue fear".


 * I think that it is high time that evaluate medical article titles using the guidelines at Manual of Style/Medicine-related articles (shortcut WP:MEDTITLE). It is clear that common name is not the only criteria to used for diseases. For example, heart attack redirects to myocardial infarction. There is no need to sacrifice precision & consistency for problematic recognizability when redirects are cheap. Peaceray (talk) 19:50, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Logical inconsistency, self contradictory sentence
Under the #9 heading - 'Gender mortality gap' the last sentence of the first paragraph is logically inconsistent ie) it makes no sense. Spyglasses (talk) 19:42, 20 May 2021 (UTC)


 * There doesn't seem to be a contradiction."Life expectancy dropped in males during the pandemic but then increased two years after the pandemic" is totally self-consistant. Life expectancy fluctuates sometimes. It is entirely possible for the life expectancy (the average age of death) to decrease during a time of disease and war and then increase in subsequent years. I don't see how it doesn't make sense. JMM12345 (talk) 15:32, 12 July 2021 (UTC)JMM12345
 * , the last sentence of the first paragraph reads: "The death rate of tuberculosis in females increased significantly and would continue to decline until post-pandemic." It is indeed unclear what information that sentence is supposed to convey.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 16:49, 12 July 2021 (UTC)

NPOV on "Spanish flu" name
I've been digging through dozens of RS, and have not found any that actually endorse the name "Spanish flu". Many avoid using it, and those that do typically put it in depreciated context right up front. The closest thing I have found to an explicit endorsement is a quote in this Snopes article attributed to AP:
 * "The Associated Press has ruled similarly. 'The name Spanish flu is entrenched both in the popular mind and among epidemiologists and has been in use for more than a century, including by the AP,' the wire service said in a March 2020 statement. 'In our view, any stigma that would attach to Spain or to the Spanish people has long ceased to be relevant'".

But I can't find the original primary source or any other secondary source citing it. I would reference this in the article for WP:Balance, but it's too controversial for a single source. I've searched quoted text and the AP site directly. I'd be interested if anyone else can find better sourcing for this claim, or any other WP:RS with an opposing viewpoint to WHO. Dhaluza (talk) 09:23, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

Stated, not supported?
The line "Spanish flu is a misnomer rooted in historical othering of infectious disease origin, which is now avoided.[6]" is merely a restatement of its reference; I thought the reference should contain some support/an explanation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.201.42.151 (talk • contribs) 16:47, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I've removed that sentence from the article. The recent RM did not result in a consensus that Spanish flu is no longer the English common name, which means it can't be a "misnomer". We can discuss the naming issues in an appropriate issue, with appropriate quotes to reliable sources, but clearly we don't say that in Wikipedia's voice. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 18:13, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I think it's clearly a misnomer, by the definition of being incorrectly named, regardless of its common name. I think it's extremely helpful to readers to have that section there so they know it was not named Spanish flu because it originated or had a outsized presence in Spain. It was in fact a misnomer. I strongly recommend it be reincluded. I would love to hear other thoughts, though. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 18:18, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It's not a misnomer if it's the common name. That's an oxymoron, as the English language doesn't have an official definition. You can point out that the disease didn't originate in Spain, sure, but you can't say that the majority of the people are wrong. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 18:29, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry, but that's not correct. Here's from the Wiki article on misnomers: a number of misnomers remain in common usage — which is to say that a word being a misnomer does not necessarily make usage of the word incorrect. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 18:33, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It is self-evident that it is a misnomer, since Spain was well down the infection chain. But can we just get an RS that states the obvious and end this silliness? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 20:21, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * The last version had an RS that stated such. It should just be reverted back to that. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 20:33, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Naming viruses after geographic regions is now discouraged by medical and academic sources. Think "China virus" and Donald Trump. This doesn't alter the fact that "Spanish flu" is still in common use.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 20:50, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * No argument there. This isn't about what to name the article or call the epidemic. It's about including the fact that it's a misnomer in the article. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 20:56, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Quote added to existing cite, and cited again after "misnomer" in lede. Dhaluza (talk) 23:10, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It's a concision of the text quoted in the reference, which in turn is a concision of the text further down in the article which is supported by multiple references (and plenty more not specifically cited). There is consensus in virtually all RS that Spanish flu is a misnomer, in that it was literally mis-named in a flawed naming process, and most authors using that name take care to point that out. Dhaluza (talk) 22:53, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I undid the removal and the misnomer statement is back in. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 22:58, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

Note: I hope that the irony is not lost that we call the article Spanish flu because that's the common name, but some editors object to calling that name a misnomer, which is the common name for what the common name is! Dhaluza (talk) 23:48, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
 * That's deep. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 00:10, 14 August 2021 (UTC)

2020 study
restored the 2020 unpublished study. The first source is from the authors themselves. The second source is the unpublished study itself. Then the third source discusses the study, but writes "But their conclusions rest on very fragile data foundations. I am not convinced the limited available data can support their relatively bold conclusions and policy recommendations about the economic impact of epidemic controls."

This study does not belong in the article. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:47, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
 * From my view, it does, as it has received widespread media coverage, for example here is another major mention, and here is another. There are plenty more. The research is new because COVID has spurred these types of studies. Absolutely belongs in the article, as the best, most rigorous analysis out there so far, in my view. Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 19:06, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It's a non-peer reviewed research that got panned for not holding up. This fails WP:MEDRS WP:RS in so many ways. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:26, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It's economics, not medicine, though. Where was it panned, other that one comment you mentioned? Pyrrho the Skeptic (talk) 20:31, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Meant WP:RS, not MEDRS. Fixed. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 03:42, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree that it should be removed. SSRN is preprint repository, and we generally consider preprints to be unreliable. There's no rush to include early findings in an article about a 100+ year-old event. If the field considers this work meaningful, it will influence future reviews and books, and we'll use those secondary sources to build this article. Ajpolino (talk) 20:35, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

Citation problems
The citation of "Porras-Gallo & Davis 2014" [48] doesn't link to that source, can anyone else fix it? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 10:21, 15 August 2021 (UTC)


 * Davis was misspelled as David. Dhaluza (talk) 13:36, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Drat! I never thought of looking for the obvious. :-( --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:25, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

Unreliable sources
I assume that all the recent work is to achieve GA: these will have to be resolved first. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:25, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
 * 1) I deleted  [64] Ferrandino V, Iacobaccio M, Sgro V (May–August 2020), European Journal of Marketing and Economics as a predatory journal but Dhaluza reinstated saying that it is no longer on the predatory list. Please recheck: I have the widget from Unreliable/Predatory Source Detector and it is still flagging it as predatory.
 * 2) The History.com citations are being flagged as "generally unreliable" (xref [114] Roos D (3 March 2020), [180] History.com; [184] Little, B).


 * I went to the source and noted that they list a diverse editorial team and claim to be double-blind-peer-reviewed, so assuming they are not faking it, that would not fit the parameters of a Predatory publisher. If you read that article, the whole concept is problematic, and accusing a publisher of being predatory is an extraordinary claim that requires extraordinary evidence. That evidence may exist. But just because an individual researcher put the publisher on a list of publications that didn't do peer review, a list that itself was not peer reviewed and is no longer maintained, isn't good enough if the publisher claims legitimacy. The tool is problematic as well since it identifies the source as "predatory" even though the original list only identified it as "potentially predatory". Dhaluza (talk) 19:51, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Doubtless you noticed that I didn't repeat the deletion. I'm just flagging up the issue because I can see it being a showstopper for GA, which I think the article deserves. Its presence doesn't seem essential to the article, being one of four citations for the same statement. If you really want to keep it then I can only suggest that you request a review of its reliability as a source.
 * I was surprised to see history.com on the naughty list too. Solution is not so obvious.
 * --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 22:10, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I've posted a follow-up question on the template talk page. User_talk:Headbomb/unreliable Dhaluza (talk) 01:28, 16 August 2021 (UTC)
 * The answers to the questions about the tool only raise more questions. Meanwhile, I contacted a couple of the publisher's academic references, and they confirmed that they the publisher is legit in their view. Dhaluza (talk) 01:04, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

Pruned the bad sourcing. History.com is not reliable, and EUSER is an unreliable predatory publisher, and the SSRN study was a unreviewed preprint. Most claims were supported by other sources, so that doesn't change much, but I've removed the passage backed by the SRRN study, and left a cn tag for the history.com passages that weren't supported by other sources. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 17:16, 17 August 2021 (UTC)
 * , I don't see history.com on Reliable sources/Perennial sources? Is there another blocklist? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 17:02, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * See WP:RSPSS. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:03, 18 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I can't believe I missed that! Sorry. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 19:59, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

"Spanish covid" listed at Redirects for discussion
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Spanish covid. The discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 August 23 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. WIKINIGHTS talk 03:23, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 3 September 2021
The information about the Spanish flu death count is severely deflated. The cdc says 500 million people died from the Spanish flu in 1918. One third of the world population at the time. 74.197.127.243 (talk) 06:03, 3 September 2021 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made.  Eve rgr een Fir  (talk) 06:07, 3 September 2021 (UTC)


 * This CDC source says "It is estimated that about 500 million people or one-third of the world’s population became infected with this virus. The number of deaths was estimated to be at least 50 million worldwide." The 500 million figure is the number of cases, not deaths.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 06:49, 3 September 2021 (UTC)

"Xenophobia"
The article says: Many alternative names are exonyms in the paradigm of making new infectious diseases seem foreign,[39][40][41] a form of xenophobia.[42][43][44] If this is meant to claim that the practice of naming diseases for foreign countries is rooted in xenophobia, then the latter three citations -- Parmet/Rothstein, O'Neill and Oh -- lend no support to this claim; if anything, they argue that it reinforces existing xenophobia and encourages bad policies (although I am not particularly convinced of this either, seeing that travel bans have successfully delayed and thus blunted the impact of COVID-19 in several countries). In either case, this isn't a particularly salient point to make in the context of a specific epidemic, seeing that the practice is centuries old. I am thus removing the "xenophobia" part of the sentence. Better sources would be appreciated. -- Darij (talk) 02:02, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Inconsistent
This says: "The earliest documented case was March 1918 in Kansas, United States, with further cases recorded in France, Germany and the United Kingdom in April." This also says: "Date February 1918 – April 1920" AND "The disease had already been observed in Haskell County as early as January 1918" so this article is very inconsistent as to when the Spanish flu started. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8003:33aa:9500:d61:8b94:3676:336b (talk • contribs) 01:44, 14 September 2021 (UTC)

a better name
I could not edit the section of the article. The Spanish flu was called Blitz Katarrh in Germany - very few sources I have seen called it "Russian pest" - Blitz Katarrh is more appropriate as it also includes the purulent exudates from the bronchi. A good ref.:https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/79/4/564 70.27.180.136 (talk) 16:09, 4 September 2021 (UTC)


 * I see no reason to remove Blitz Katarrh from the group of epithets. However it seem like your request can be added after Flandern-Fieber e.g "while German soldiers used 'Flandern-Fieber' (Flemish fever), both after a famous battlefield in Belgium where many soldiers on both sides fell ill or Blitz Katarrh because those who caught it died so quickly. In fact the first both looks like an error and should be removed"EatingFudge (talk) 00:16, 14 September 2021 (UTC)


 * on a related note, the article title should be the dates, it is known as the spanish flu but that can be a redirect, it almost certainly was not from spain. Irtapil (talk) 03:52, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 8 February 2021 and 21 May 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Dmosh75. Peer reviewers: Jbuec2, Moblit.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 09:56, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Flanders is not a battlefield
The major part of southern Flanders was the major area fought over during WW1. Flanders, however, is a far larger region, typified by the use of the Flemish dialects of the Low German family of languages, although these extend into France as far as Lille. The actual battlefields are typically more specific, the Yser (a river), Passendaele (a village), etc. I'd therefore suggest the liminatory comment that the German term refers to a battlefield is inaccurate, they're actually referring to the administrative area they were in when the disease first became endemic in the various prisoner of war, hospital, displacement camps and barracks after the end of hostilities: it then spread with repatriation. The significance is that WWI was by then functionally over. The defeat of the German Spring Offensive by May had broken the German will to fight, and although the Allied 100 days offensive in August started on the presumption it would be a struggle, it soon became a mopping-up operation, interning captured Germans in the setting which caused it to become endemic. The description of a battlefield is therefore inaccurate, I'd suggest a more neutral term like "the Southern Flanders region where many were interned." I cannot make the change myself, as my great-grandfather was mayor of Oostende, having distinguished himself as a field commander of the Belgian Army, stopping The Race to the Sea at the start of the War. NPOV might be an issue. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.68.80.209 (talk) 19:30, 19 January 2022 (UTC)


 * We don't have an article on Southern Flanders, or a geographic definition of the region. The article on the County of Flanders mentions that "South-Flanders" was used as a term for French Flanders. Dimadick (talk) 03:29, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

experiments with survivors
"In 2021 an investigation[310] used the virus sequence[292] to obtain the Hemagglutinin (HA) antigen " has to be changed to "In 2008 an investigation[310] used the virus sequence[292] to obtain the Hemagglutinin (HA) antigen ". There were almost no survivors in 2021. Instead, the information of a 2008 paper was retrieved in 2021 Josep Pericas (talk) 09:28, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

Sex differences in mortality
Propose that the sentence "The death rate of tuberculosis in females increased significantly and would continue to decline until post-pandemic.[311]" be changed to "The death rate of tuberculosis in females increased significantly, returning to normal post-pandemic.[311]"

This both deals with the contradiction in the existing sentence and accurately reflects the conclusions of [311].

OzMusher (talk) 03:32, 28 January 2022 (UTC)

Rename “Spanish Flu” back to “1918-1920 H1N1 epidemic to prevent racism
If we're naming Covid-19 “Coronavirus” to prevent racism against the Chinese then we should rename “Spanish Flu” 1918-20 H1N1 epidemic because calling it Spanish Flu is racist against Spanish speaking people. It’s been proven multiple times that Naming viruses after a region/nation will increase discrimination. It is a violation of WHO’s medical law. 69.244.83.111 (talk) 19:48, 30 August 2021 (UTC)
 * (a) The Covid-19 virus is a coronavirus, one of many.
 * [COVID = COrona VIrus Disease].
 * (b) The WHO deprecates calling major new viruses after the place they were first identified, lest the bad publicity dissuade early reports. That is what happened with the 'Spanish' flu. But this is now, that was then. See item (c).
 * (c) This proposal was thoroughly discussed at : there is no point in raising it again before mid-2022 at the earliest. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 19:56, 30 August 2021 (UTC)


 * See the half dozen discussions on this mentioned in the banners at the top of the page. The gist of it is that Spanish flu is the WP:COMMONNAME for the epidemic, while the Wuhan flu or Chinese flu is not the common name for the COVID-19 pandemic. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:57, 30 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Additionally, the WHO doesn't make any laws. At best, they make recommendations. &#32; Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 19:58, 30 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I disagree with you heavily, and I have only one comment: bruh
 * EytanMelech (talk) 15:24, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia's Neutral point of view policy says sometimes neutral point of view must be balanced against clarity. Neutral_point_of_view People don't know about the "H1N1 epidemic". People do know about the "Spanish flu". But they also know about the "Great influenza epidemic". So that is an idea? 2001:8003:33AA:9500:D61:8B94:3676:336B (talk) 02:21, 14 September 2021 (UTC)

How/why did it end?
Am I missing something (it's a long article) or does the article fail to say anything about how and why the "Spanish flu" (no slur intended) ended? Did we develop herd immunity, or was it some pharma innovation, or what? If it doesn't say anything about that, the article is incomplete. If we still don't know how it ended, the article should say that. HandsomeMrToad (talk) 16:29, 6 January 2021 (UTC)


 * See the threads Talk:Spanish_flu and Talk:Spanish_flu above. It doesn't make sense to assume that Influenza A virus subtype H1N1 magically vanished off the face of the earth after 1920, so one of the most likely explanations is that it mutated into less virulent forms. As for sourcing, this says "The impact of this pandemic was not limited to 1918–1919. All influenza A pandemics since that time, and indeed almost all cases of influenza A worldwide (excepting human infections from avian viruses such as H5N1 and H7N7), have been caused by descendants of the 1918 virus, including "drifted" H1N1 viruses and reassorted H2N2 and H3N2 viruses. The latter are composed of key genes from the 1918 virus, updated by subsequently incorporated avian influenza genes that code for novel surface proteins, making the 1918 virus indeed the "mother" of all pandemics." This goes some way towards answering the oft-asked question "What happened to this strain of flu after 1920?" This is already mentioned as a theory in the article, although as ever with Spanish flu, it is only a theory and other possibilities are available.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 17:19, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

It seems reasonable to add a subsection to this article to address this question. We are now all wondering how COVID 19 will end. According to History.com:


 * "What’s even more remarkable about the 1918 flu, say infectious disease experts, is that it never really went away. After infecting an estimated 500 million people worldwide in 1918 and 1919 (a third of the global population), the H1N1 strain that caused the Spanish flu receded into the background and stuck around as the regular seasonal flu."


 * "But every so often, direct descendants of the 1918 flu combined with bird flu or swine flu to create powerful new pandemic strains, which is exactly what happened in 1957, 1968 and 2009. Those later flu outbreaks, all created in part by the 1918 virus, claimed millions of additional lives, earning the 1918 flu the odious title of “the mother of all pandemics." CorkyH (talk) 21:18, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

I agree -- the one part of the History in the current article is not very informative. The reference doesn't mention the pandemic outbreaks from the seasonal flu, or the potential for cross-species outbreaks (swine, avian, etc.). Thus it seems tricky to just title a section "end of pandemic" -- maybe "end of 1918 pandemic"? And give qualifiers that the 1918 flu virus continues to evolve and produce pandemics? --198.209.9.251 (talk) 22:58, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

Climate study in the lead
"scientists offer several explanations for the high mortality, including a six-year climate anomaly affecting migration of disease vectors with increased likelihood of spread through bodies of water"

This is sourced to a single study. It is interesting and worthy of note, but it does not justify weight in the lead.2600:8800:B85:B800:C55:224C:4C99:4130 (talk) 09:52, 3 April 2022 (UTC)
 * I agree. Any opposition? --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 10:10, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

Small wording change, but...
"making it the second deadliest pandemic in human history after the Black Death bubonic plague of 1346–1353."

Wouldn't it be "recorded history?" Just a thought. 2603:8001:2A00:7428:F949:779A:5A86:FDFB (talk) 04:48, 29 July 2022 (UTC)
 * By definition, history is that which is recorded [by the victors]. Though "recorded history" is commonly seen... --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 10:10, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

link to Spain during World War I
I would appreciate a link to Spain during World War I, I think it is appropriate. 139.47.75.114 (talk) 20:48, 25 August 2022 (UTC)


 * ✅ Peaceray (talk) 04:05, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

inclusion of findings published in Journal of Infectious Diseases in 2008
Could a qualified editor please include the following information, possibly at the end of the "Misdiagnosis" section?

Thank you very kindly. 2600:4040:780C:6F00:F9FB:6959:BC3E:6B62 (talk) 12:40, 13 September 2022 (UTC)


 * It's possible, but the article already makes clear that most of the deaths were caused by a secondary infection of bacterial pneumonia, and the NIH source is already used in the article.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 13:26, 13 September 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 21 July 2021
<div class="boilerplate" style="background-color: #efe; margin: 0; padding: 0 10px 0 10px; border: 1px dotted #aaa;">
 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: not moved. Article titles are decided according to the Article titles policy and its associated guidelines. To summarise arguments:
 * In support of the move, editors linked to authoritative sources (WHO, CDC, NIH, Britannica) and based their argument on the name used by those sources. They also said the name was used in academic sources, without evidence but the claim was not disputed by opposers. Some supporters also argued it was a more clear/descriptive/accurate title.
 * The opposes centred around WP:COMMONNAME. Very few opposers cited any evidence. Those that did later in the discussion were Robert Brockway (linking to Google Trends) and Amakuru (linking to Google Ngrams) showing a preference for "Spanish flu". A lot of editors cited "the reasons in the last RM" as their rationale. That seems to be this discussion, although it's not immediately clear to me what evidence that refers to.

Overall, with ~65 editors participating, 70% opposed to the move, and the opposes growing in proportion to supports, there is clearly strong numerical opposition against the move. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 20:18, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

Spanish flu → 1918 flu pandemic – The current name may have been more popular in the past, but it is now obsolete slang. If you do a web search on "Spanish Flu" the current WP:RS results largely come back as 1918 flu, or some variation thereof. The U.S. CDC, NIH, and National Archives have all standardized on this form, as has Britannica. There was nothing Spanish about the flu, except that Spain was more transparent about their observations, while combatants in WW-I were withholding info for military reasons, so Spanish flu is not a truly descriptive title. The article is mostly about the pandemic, not the flu virus per se. The date is even more relevant context now with the passage of more than a century's time. So it's time for Wikipedia to move on too. Dhaluza (talk) 03:37, 21 July 2021 (UTC) —Relisting. Jack Frost (talk) 12:17, 29 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Support – The reasons given above are excellent. HiLo48 (talk) 03:50, 21 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Support: I am tempted to support this, despite saying on numerous occasions in the past that Spanish flu is the WP:COMMONNAME in news media articles (which it is). The opening sentence could say "The 1918 flu pandemic, also known as Spanish flu".-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 07:09, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, but I think WP:NPOVNAME point 2: "Colloquialisms where far more encyclopedic alternatives are obvious" is particularly applicable in this case, e.g. https://www.britannica.com/event/influenza-pandemic-of-1918-1919 (but we should use the more concise version "1918 flu pandemic" per WP:CRITERIA) Dhaluza (talk) 10:01, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support for reasons already given (and the current name is not even accurate, as explained in the article). I too have changed my mind on this one. --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 09:19, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose There is nothing unencyclopedic about "Spanish flu", as the title reflects the historical name of the illness, even if it probably did not originate in Spain. It should not be changed to a less common name in an attempt to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS. An explanation of why it recieved the name within the article is good enough.ZXCVBNM (TALK) 10:28, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Note that per WP:COMMONNAME we use the common name in an encyclopedic register. Yes, "Spanish flu" may be the most common historical name, but in current usage it's obsolete and becoming archaic, like the Vapours (mental condition). It's not about righting past wrongs, it's about reflecting the evolving consensus. Dhaluza (talk) 11:46, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I should clarify, that I am referring to current usage in authoritative sources that know what they are talking about, e.g. WHO CDC NIH. Sources that are not authoritative and just churning historical content do still commonly use "Spanish," but we are not stuck following their lead for historical purposes. Dhaluza (talk) 13:51, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Although official, scientific, birth, original, or trademarked names are often used for article titles, the term or name most typically used in reliable sources is generally preferred. Other encyclopedias are among the sources that may be helpful in deciding what titles are in an encyclopedic register, as well as what names are most frequently used. All it says is that encylopedias are among the sources used, not that encyclopedias are the gold standard for article titles.  Bait30   Talk 2 me pls? 03:36, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * OK, can you cite a current conflicting source using Spanish flu in encyclopedic register? Dhaluza (talk) 12:35, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment: WP:GOOGLE shows that "Spanish flu" is still used widely, but what it doesn't show is that most modern medical textbooks and academic works prefer "1918 flu pandemic". This is why I've changed my mind.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 10:42, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose. It is utterly untrue that Spanish flu is "now obsolete slang" or "obsolete and becoming archaic". Accurate or not, it is still the WP:COMMONNAME for the pandemic. Comparing it to the vapours is frankly laughable. -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:42, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support there's been a clear shift in the last year—blindlynx (talk) 13:57, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Strong oppose. We went through this a year ago and the result was to not move. My opinion stays the same. (We could move it to or similar to make it clear this page is about the pandemic, but "Spanish flu" in some form remains the common name.)  O.N.R.  (talk) 14:43, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose, per common name, most familiar name, and discussion. Randy Kryn (talk) 20:43, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Now agree that 1918-1920 Spanish flu pandemic works as well. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:46, 22 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Support. Though Spanish flu has some historical momentum and still outnumbers 1918 flu on my Google search results (only by 2-to-1), the latter is gaining ground for substantive and social reasons. Including the year in the title is also more objectively correct, which helps to trump the progressively weakening WP:Common argument. Separately, I support having the word pandemic in the title as being more descriptive of what's in the article. — RCraig09 (talk) 21:48, 21 July 2021 (UTC)
 * —Supplemental: Use of the year in the name by WHO, CDC, and NIH as linked above, is additionally convincing. It's time to change. — RCraig09 (talk) 21:56, 21 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Support 1918 flu pandemic or 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. The article is about the pandemic itself, not the illness, so it should follow the same convention as Swine influenza/2009 swine flu pandemic and COVID-19/COVID-19 pandemic. Rublov (talk) 00:27, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support per nom. The word "pandemic" should 100% be added to the title (as the article's about the pandemic, not the disease), and it seems academic works now prefer "1918 flu pandemic" then the increasingly archaic "Spanish flu [pandemic]". Paintspot Infez (talk) 00:36, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Alternate proposal: 1918-1920 Spanish flu pandemic, the years consistent with entries at Category:Cholera pandemics and many other such pages as 1957–1958 influenza pandemic. Start and end years seem to be the Wikipedia style (written or unwritten?) and the present Covid pandemic will likely be renamed at some point for consistency. Randy Kryn (talk) 03:57, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I think that title is unnecessarily specific. The problem with the current "Spanish flu" title is that it's insufficiently specific. What would a child or naïve reader who has never heard of this expect to find under this title? Adding 1918 tells a lot, i.e. this is about an early 20th century historical event. Adding pandemic makes it clear this is about the worldwide spread of the disease, and that flu refers to influenza disease, not the virus per se. Adding -1920 doesn't add much, because we know pandemics generally last a few years. And Britanica calls it the Influenza pandemic of 1918–19 so the end year is not definitive. I would also argue that in the alternative "1918 Spanish flu pandemic" the adjective "Spanish" adds more confusion than clarity. Yes, if you have heard of "Spanish flu" it will be familiar, but if you have not heard of it, it doesn't help. Dhaluza (talk) 12:57, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Full years and duration for similar page consistency across the site, 1918-1920 per sources and language used on the page (see the article's second sentence and Spanish flu), and 'Spanish' for the common name. A combo which will put Britannica to shame and cause them to fill their page with more pop-up ads. Randy Kryn (talk) 13:47, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment: if you search "Spanish flu definition" there is no clear consensus in dictionary definitions whether it primarily refers to the virus or the pandemic. So I have created the Spanish flu (disambiguation) page. I believe Spanish flu should redirect there. Dhaluza (talk) 10:53, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME and ONR. This is becoming repetitive now. The current name is the correct one. &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 11:09, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Is "Chinese Flu" the correct name for the current pandemic? HiLo48 (talk) 01:55, 23 July 2021 (UTC)
 * No, because it's not the common name. The common name is Coronavirus or COVID-19. PaintTrash (talk) 11:36, 27 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Oppose - I originally nominated this page to be moved, but my opinion has changed since then. I think that most reliable sources will continue to use the current name per WP:COMMONNAME. However, if reliable sources call it by that name in the future, I'd be willing to support it in the future. Interstellarity (talk) 12:36, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I think the most reliable current sources are using some variation of "1918 flu pandemic" in the present. Here again are the links cited above: WHO CDC NIH Britannica Dhaluza (talk) 13:08, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support. In the past, I would have opposed this. But the opposition above has shown close to zero evidence that the current title is the common name at this point in time. Also, as pointed out above by Rublov, this article is primarily about the pandemic and not the actual flu virus involved. Perhaps if there was a separate article on the virus it would be more appropriate to use the name "Spanish flu" for it, but the pandemic article is different. -- Calidum  13:55, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, many assertions of WP:COMMONNAME without evidence, ignoring the subsequent section WP:POVTITLE which creates an additional burden of proof for using "Non-neutral but common names," i.e. to show "the subject of an article is referred to mainly by a single common name, as evidenced through usage in a significant majority of English-language sources." No one has provided evidence of this. As pointed out, RS use both "Spanish flu/influenza" and "1918 flu/pandemic" in common names. Another common name is The Great Influenza, after The Great War, the former name for WW-I before WW-II. I don't see that a single type of name is used in a significant majority of English-language sources, or even in just the cited sources in the article. What I do see is that more serious recent sources appear to be moving to use the more neutral "1918" in lieu of the historical artifact "Spanish" to distinguish the flu, and so we should move now too. Dhaluza (talk) 22:51, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * There are millions of text-books, newspaper articles ect that will call it The Spanish Flu and such - and this will forever be in their index pages - until books become uncommon that's not going away 217.45.105.241 (talk) 18:49, 26 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. <span style="font-family:'Linux Libertine','Georgia','Times',serif"> Peter Ormond &#128172;  05:29, 25 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Tentative support with caveats - provided it is made VERY clear that "this is known to popular culture as "The Spanish Flu pandemic" in the header, and a redirect naturally set up - I don't see a problem. However much written material and also people alive know it as "Spanish Flu", the only reason to oppose that I see is that names for things are often easier - "Spanish Flu" is easier than the 1918 Flu epidemic or pandemic (or whatever) even if it is just a name.
 * It is always silly to use a different name for the sake of it - however there is significant traction on "1918 flu" - but this will never replace the massive body of newspapers in archives that use "Spanish Flu" or other materials.
 * 217.45.105.241 (talk) 18:37, 26 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I also might slightly oppose it, I can see why, the thrust of the argument (which is hopefully true) is that other respected information sources use the 1918 name - if they didn't I'd strongly oppose
 * 217.45.105.241 (talk) 18:39, 26 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I hate to add to this but I'm right on the fence, I have a question to those that oppose (seriously):
 * If not now, when?
 * But the colloquial name must still be present front and centre, bolded as "(archaically known as The Spanish Flu)" or something; unfortunately as with anything this on the fence, there'll be no consensus, good luck!
 * 217.45.105.241 (talk) 18:47, 26 July 2021 (UTC)
 * To use a non-neutral name like this, it is not enough that the name is in common use, it must be commonly used by a significant majority of sources pert WP:NPOVNAME. I don't see evidence that it is commonly used by a significant majority of current sources. No doubt there are a ton of historical sources, but since this subject lies somewhere on the intersection between social science and medical science, and science is subject to change as new knowledge is developed, current sources should be given more weight. We would not keep an obsolete hypothesis in current context after it has been disproven, just because there are more historical references for it. Dhaluza (talk) 22:59, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. We don't need to rename everything retrospectively just for the sake of contemporary political correctness. Also, it's literally "Spanish flu" in almost every language. --Oppashi Talk 20:27, 27 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment: It's nothing to do with political correctness. There has been a shift on this issue in the last twelve months, and the preferred academic and medical term is 1918 flu pandemic. If the mainstream media hasn't caught up with this, it should.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 21:27, 27 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Strong Oppose Nobody I know personally refers to it as the 1918 flu pandemic. It's also more convenient to refer to this epidemic as the Spanish flu and I strongly disagree that the term Spanish flu is "obsolete slang." 71.172.3.145 (talk) 23:38, 27 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I believe it is obsolete in that current sources are not favoring "Spanish flu" over alternatives, in fact they tend to use it in depreciated context as a historical artifact or relic. And it is clearly slang, because serious authors have avoided using it as well. As the article lays out, it is clearly a misnomer as well. Dhaluza (talk) 22:51, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support: I think 1918 flu pandemic is the suitable title for this article, see also: 1957–1958 influenza pandemic and 2009 swine flu pandemic for similar cases. Dede2008 (talk) 14:28, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per COMMONNAME -- In actu (Guerillero) Parlez Moi 14:40, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Saying it doesn't make it so. I could not find evidence that "Spanish flu" is still used as the common name by a significant majority of current sources. Dhaluza (talk) 00:10, 29 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Let me help you then:  &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 14:35, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Support: as Dhaluza has pointed out, reliable sources (e.g., the WHO, CDC, etc.) use 1918 flu pandemic or 1918 influenza pandemic rather than Spanish flu. To add, the fact that archived newspapers used the term Spanish flu is not relevant to whether it is the contemporary favored term, and it is straightforward to state in the opening sentence that the outbreak had historically been known by that name. A compromise such as 1918 Spanish flu pandemic would create needless confusion—as stated, the term Spanish flu is declining, so adding the year to the existing title does not actually fix what is wrong with it. --Delta1989 (talk) (contributions) 18:02, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment: For those who have indicated they are on the fence, here is another WP:RS published just the other day: “Spanish Flu”: When Infectious Disease Names Blur Origins and Stigmatize Those Infected. By Trevor Hoppe Jul 26, 2021 (physiciansweekly.com). This is typical of current sources only using the term "Spanish flu" in depreciated context, i.e. in "scare quotes", e.g.: “Spanish flu”-a name that reflects a tendency in public health history to associate new infectious diseases with foreign nationals and foreign countries. Dhaluza (talk) 22:44, 28 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Sorry, upon further examination, it turns out this is a republication of a 2018 NIH paper Dhaluza (talk) 05:48, 29 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Strong support for the move as proposed. "1918 flu pandemic" will far more clearly identify the scope of the topic for a substantial number of readers. BD2412  T 00:17, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment Pinging all participants of the previous RM (apologies for those who already participated): Lua error in Module:PingRFCParticipants at line 43: attempt to perform arithmetic on local 'i' (a nil value).  (Note: This new tool/template may produce an error). Regards   Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 00:47, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I guess I will have to ping manually all previous participants of the previous RM (apologies for those who already participated; split into multiple parts due to template limitations):
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 14:58, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 15:00, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 15:00, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 15:01, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 15:02, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 15:03, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Regards  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 15:04, 31 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Support per nomination. A once-frequently-referenced name form but, in 2021, it has become severely outdated and is well past its original inaccurate use. —Roman Spinner (talk • contribs) 07:32, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per all the reasons laid out last time WP:COMMONNAME applies, not evidence for significant shift in name usage.  Spy-cicle💥   Talk? 13:25, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Strongly Oppose The pandemic is widely known as the Spanish Flu, changing will lead to confusion.Chrisisreed (talk) 14:37, 30 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Really? Among whom? I won't be confused. HiLo48 (talk) 04:28, 31 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Comment Note that the Spanish language Wikipedia title is es:Pandemia de gripe de 1918 (Influenza pandemic of 1918), but the German and French pages use Spanish flu: de:Spanische Grippe & fr:Grippe espagnole. An interesting side note is that while the English page says the origin is indeterminate, the Spanish, German and French pages all conclusively point to a U.S. origin, as do the Spanish, German and French language sources. Dhaluza (talk) 12:20, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose for the same reason I did last time. This is the common name in use in English. Robert Brockway (talk) 15:07, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose Spanish flu was and is its common name.Slatersteven (talk) 15:12, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Comment Google Trends suggests that Spanish Flu is dominant as can be seen here. Robert Brockway (talk) 15:13, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose, per common name, most familiar name, and discussion. We shouldn’t use modern-day PC logic to counteract or revision a historically-accepted name. TropicAces (talk) 15:16, 31 July 2021 (UTC)tropicAces
 * Support per WP:COMMONNAME "Common names" can (and often do) change; the proposed name has become prevalent in RS, and does not shame the country of origin.  Mini  apolis  15:17, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per common name. Diseases are often named after a place like Ebola river and we use those names if they are the most common. Wikipedia follows convention not lead with new conventions. The best way to handle this is a detailed etymological history in the article.  --  Green  C  15:18, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per last year's arguments. Not much has changed since then. StAnselm (talk) 15:30, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose Simple WP:COMMONNAME applies here, just as if the current pandemic became popularly known as the "China Virus" (It came from China!). As mentioned above, this is a historically accepted name and in keeping with naming it after the place where it originated from.  The C of E God Save the Queen!  ( talk ) 15:33, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * , you wrote in keeping with naming it after the place where it originated from: so are you proposing that we change the name to Kansas Flu, then? -John Maynard Friedman (talk) 15:43, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I think you'll find that the practice was where the first cases are discovered, rather than where it originated. Chaosdruid (talk) 18:49, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Not quite, especially as the first cases were discovered in Kansas, then France, then Germany and England; it spread to Spain quite late in the day. No, the actual practice was to use the name where the first open public health records were made which, given that there was a war on and it was strategically significant to the war effort, could only ever have happened in a neutral country. It is for precisely this reason that the WHO deprecates that naming practice, because they recognise that it creates a serious risk that reporting and thus counter-measures will be delayed to avoid the bad publicity (in the hope that some other sucker will create the first record). --John Maynard Friedman (talk) 23:10, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I seem to remember the French called it "The American flu" for a while until they conceded it was probably best to remain friends with the USA lol --- I guess we will never know, but here were reports from the UK for a couple of years prior to the US and Spanish cases, but determining if it was indeed the same virus is impossible. Chaosdruid (talk) 08:49, 1 August 2021 (UTC)


 * Strongly Oppose. Same opinion as last year per WP:COMMONNAME and general historical consensus on the name. Kettleonwater (talk) 15:39, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Strong oppose per Necrothesp, ZXCVBNM, Slatersteven, and others directly above. This feels like a "righting great wrongs" thing. — <i style="color:#8000FF">Czello</i> 15:40, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per all concurring points above. - JGabbard (talk) 15:43, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose it is obviously still the common name. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:53, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support...'1918 influenza pandemic' is common enough and appears in CDC &WHO. John M. Barry calls it The Great Influenza and '1918 influenza pandemic'. IMO... a good explanation of why not to call it 'Spanish Flu' is given by Laura Spinney here “One of the few certainties we have about the Spanish Flu Pandemic is that it didn’t start in Spain. We actually don’t know where it did start – but we know it didn’t start in Spain. The Spanish felt, and to a very great degree were, stigmatised by this....In 2015, the World Health Organisation (WHO) put out guidelines for how to name a disease. WHO say it should be avoided: "Terms that should be avoided in disease names include geographic locations (e.g. .. Spanish Flu)" Whispyhistory (talk) 15:54, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support per Whispyhistory's rationale. Veverve (talk) 16:05, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per others above, I don't see what's actually changed since the last time this RM discussion was had. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs  talk 16:12, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose I do not see that anything has changed since the previous RM. The current title is still the COMMONNAME, and thus still the most recognizable. Blueboar (talk) 16:20, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose-Per WP:Common name and the fact that only a little more than a year ago we already had an RfC on this issue. Display name 99 (talk) 16:22, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose-Per WP:Common name as before. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 16:37, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose-Per WP:Common name as settled in the previous RfC--Havsjö (talk) 16:47, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose-Per WP:Common name as settled in the previous RfCTwospoonfuls (εἰπέ) 16:53, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose-Per WP:Common name. RopeTricks (talk) 17:04, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose It's still the common name and the fact that academic sources frequently use '1918 flu' doesn't override that fact TocMan (talk) 17:43, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per, as much as I realize Wikipedia's strong transience and constant changes, I still feel that it's revisionist, and that medical nomenclature should not be the strongest force in naming. For example, Charles Arthur Salvador is called by his most common name on his article, as opposed to how he is known currently. As far as I know, nothing else on this website is in the process of saving things known by common names into their newer variations. Wikipedia should anyway be a fundamentally human project, oriented towards readers and not faceless bodies and consensuses. Ted (talk)
 * Support - the old title was better. Moving this page to "Spanish Flu" was always a mistake, it's inaccurate and not used by the best sources. Blythwood (talk) 19:21, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Weak Support but stong support for 1918 "Spanish" influenza pandemic ... Last year I vehemently opposed the suggested change. My reasons were WP:commonname, WP:recentism (political pandering and revisionism). Commonname was especially troubling, as this very article is used as an example of when the common name should be applied "Spanish flu (not: 1918 influenza pandemic)". I am having to rethink that now, as a google search for "Spanish flu" has decidedly reduced numbers. The results ratio is still 6.5 to 1, Spanish to flu. The first 15 results have very much surprised me in that of the first 15 sites: 7 of them are NOT titled "Spanish Flu", but titled "1918 flu" and have it as "known as 'Spanish flu' ... " in the body of text; of the remaining 8, Wikipedia is the first, so that leaves an even split.
 * The weight of those results leaves me slightly leaning towards a rename as per the OP; however, I would prefer to call it the 1918 "Spanish flu" epidemic - simply because putting it in quotes means we are suggesting it is the name given by others. Jumping to page 10 of the search results and it is still a 6/4 split Spanish/1918. I cannot, in good conscience, use google anymore to differentiate which name is most common. We also know that in reference and medical books and journals, "1918" is more commonplace, so commonname is currently moot.
 * Pandering is not an issue now, as it is definitely not going to be recentism. An established and clear move to calling it "1918 flu" is well underway since the early 1990s, and looks as if it will be adopted as the norm.
 * Similarly, revisionism is unlikely to be an issue for the same reasons - even though I can see one person commenting on "China flu" and desperately wanting the "Spanish" to be left so they can justify their naming convention. It cannot be said to be a political move to change it from Spanish, it is more the world correcting the previously century old incorrect name. Hence, I very slowly fall off the fence on the side of renaming. I would still prefer to have both in the title, at least until there is a clear cut commonname falling towards one or the other. Chaosdruid (talk) 19:42, 31 July 2021 (UTC)

<div style="padding-left: 1.6em; font-style: italic; border-top: 1px solid #a2a9b1; margin: 0.5em 0; padding-top: 0.5em">The discussion above is closed. <b style="color: #FF0000;">Please do not modify it.</b> Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Oppose I'm afraid my position has not changed since last time. I have searched again today, and the WP:Common Name still appears to be either Spanish Flu, or 1918 Spanish Flu, but not 1918 flu pandemic, and it's not close. Agent00x (talk) 20:06, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose for the same reasons I've raised in the earlier move request. I do not believe circumstances have adequately changed since then. -- benlisquare T•C•E 20:11, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:Common Name. I should note that even if the article was successfully renamed you'd probably have to say something in the lede about the pandemic being commonly referred to as the Spanish flu anyway.Dvaderv2 (talk) 20:17, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:Common Name and previous RfC. This pandemic has been named Spanish flu for a century.  --Dirk Beetstra T  C 20:40, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose-Per WP:Common name as settled in the previous RfC. Maximajorian Viridio (talk) 21:18, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Support. When this discussion came up back in March of last year, I was opposed to this move per WP:COMMONNAME and WP:RECENTISM, and also because the discussion thread had degenerated into partisan name calling. But sixteen months later, now that this no no longer a political football, we can look at this objectively and move along with the current consensus away from the then-popular "Spanish flu" designation, which (of course) was always inaccurate. -- AyaK (talk) 21:31, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Spanish flu is the COMMONNAME and far more recognisable. --Tataral (talk) 22:34, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose. There is still not enough sourcing in the OP to support the change. Thus, I continue to oppose it. Jdcomix (talk) 23:01, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Whether the name "Spanish flu" is accurate or not is irrelevant; either way, it is the COMMONNAME. Guinea pigs aren't from Guinea and turkeys aren't from Turkey, but that doesn't stop us from using those names as article titles. Zacwill (talk) 23:31, 31 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose, the Spanish flu is the common name of this historic event, even if it's not accurate. The Battle of Tannenberg wasn't fought at or even near Tannenberg either. Neozoen (talk) 00:07, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. —Lowellian (reply) 03:23, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. Common names are what they are, accurate or not (cf. Battle of Bunker Hill). Dmoore5556 (talk) 03:56, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Strongly Oppose – per WP:COMMONNAME. The most commonly-used name for this pandemic is "Spanish Flu pandemic". I see nothing wrong with the name, nor do I see any reason to go against a site-wide policy.  Light and Dark2000  🌀 (talk) 04:40, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Support "1918 flu pandemic" is clear, accurate, and what is used by the majority of high quality sources. Doc James  (talk · contribs · email) 05:19, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose for the same reason I did last time. This is the common name in use in English. Et0048 (talk) 05:42, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose – I don't see what has changed since last time that makes the common name argument any less compelling. Master of Time   ( talk ) 06:14, 1 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Support as 1918 flu pandemic is the name used in academia. Lede should mention its common name as well, though. SQB (talk) 12:39, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

Unfortunately this discussion was closed by ProcrastinatingReader based in large part on a comment by Amakuru made only a day ago without an opportunity to respond. His search is somewhat misleading because of the synonyms 'flu' and 'influenza' with the latter preferred by more formal sources using 1918. If you expand the search to cover both, the result is very different. Dhaluza (talk) 11:27, 2 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, but for some reason you removed the present title "Spanish flu" from the search. It reads very differently with it back in:  &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 11:31, 2 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Yes, I was trying to get an apples-to-apples comparison with 3-word search terms. Obviously the shorter 2-word term gets more hits. But even a simple Google Books search with all terms: doesn't show a clear preference for Spanish over 1918. Dhaluza (talk) 12:21, 2 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I should have ORed the other terms as well, and included great. Use this one instead: Dhaluza (talk) 12:35, 2 August 2021 (UTC)
 * The problem with including Spanish flu is that many authors mention it in depreciated form but don't use it meaningfully. If you do a wildcard search in title case the trend is clearer: Dhaluza (talk) 11:09, 3 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It is a bit disappointing that I missed this discussion, but I would say that the true problem was the mass pinging as it did not take into account that the March 2020 RM had brigading involved. Granted, it is a near impossible situation to deal with (except not pinging any blocked users and maybe not pinging those whose last edit was said RM).  --Super Goku V (talk) 07:26, 3 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't have a horse in this race, and this is exactly my impression as an outside observer as well. Ain92 (talk) 20:44, 5 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Also my assessment. The mass pinging was unnecessary and it's telling that the initial discussion was split initially but seemed to be overwhelmingly oppose after the pings... —Locke Cole • t • c 01:06, 6 August 2021 (UTC)
 * It seems the closer ProcrastinatingReader paid little attention to the trend and quality of usage of the terms ("1918" vs. "Spanish"), and more attention to the trend of invited, late-arriving editors rendering opinions here. In my view, that is the wrong emphasis, and, taken with the fact that WP:COMMONNAME is only one factor to consider, this decision was rendered wrongly. — RCraig09 (talk) 21:03, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

Rename “Spanish Flu” back to “1918-1920 H1N1 epidemic to prevent xenophobia
If we're naming "Wuhan Flu" "Covid-19" or “Coronavirus” to prevent Sinophobia then we should rename “Spanish Flu” back to "1918-20 H1N1 epidemic" because calling H1N1 epidemic "Spanish Flu" is xenophobic against Spanish people. Here's a fact, H1N1 epidemic originated in Kansas, America, not Spain. To call H1N1 epidemic "Spanish Flu" is a misnomer. Naming viruses after a region/nation is a violation of WHO’s medical law because it encourages racism, xenophobia, and discrimination as show when Donald Trump renaming "Covid-19"to "Wuhan Flu "caused an increase of Sinophobic assault incidents in America in 2020. 2601:40:5:E61:8D44:5277:7FF0:43C2 (talk) 21:55, 30 March 2022 (UTC)


 * The article is very clear that Spanish flu is a misnomer and points this out in the opening sentence. However, the last discussion decided to stick with it per WP:COMMONNAME. It is not a fact that the pandemic originated in Kansas; this is a common theory but the evidence is not considered to be overwhelming. There is a separate article Xenophobia and racism related to the COVID-19 pandemic where this is more on topic.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 05:40, 31 March 2022 (UTC)


 * Spanish people are not some oppressed minority here in Europe though, and I’ve encountered far more prejudice being directed against say, French, German and Eastern European people than I have against Spaniards. However, I think “1918-1920 influenza epidemic” (and variations of) is a *far* better fit for an encyclopaedia article today. Spanish Flu just feels dated & non-academic regardless of common name usage. Just my 2c which is largely opinion though, haha…SinoDevonian (talk) 14:28, 15 July 2022 (UTC)


 * If you look up books, some call this pandemic The Great Pandemic or The Great 1918 Flu Pandemic. If you type in google "The Great Pandemic" books and info pop up abut the Spanish flu pandemic. So I agree with Sino and IP: 2601:40:5:E61:8D44:5277:7FF0:43C2. You should still leave it in the page that "the Spanish Flu is a misnomer" or/and list other names, but I feel we should change the title. 104.218.156.198 (talk) 00:05, 21 July 2022 (UTC)
 * I myself as a Mexican-Spaniard find the denomination terribly racist and outdated. Trump was widely criticized for his allusions to the "Chinese virus" but we are still here stuck with the Spanish flu misnomer in the Wikipedia nonetheless...2806:107E:D:2AF6:2C9D:169C:BB08:A7E0 (talk) 05:36, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Second-deadliest pandemic in human history
The lede states that "Estimates of deaths range from 17 million to 50 million, and possibly as high as 100 million, making it the second-deadliest pandemic in human history after the Black Death bubonic plague of 1346–1353," but HIV has killed an estimated 40 million people, so if the low estimates of the death toll are correct, then it is not the second-deadliest pandemic in human history, and given that the Plague of Justinian may also have killed more people too, perhaps a better sentence would be "Estimates of deaths range from 17 million to 50 million, and possibly as high as 100 million, making it one of the deadliest pandemics in human history"? There is a link to the "List of epidemics," right there in the sentence itself, so people can go there and make up their own minds if they are interested, instead of going away with potentially faulty information, believing it to be fact? FillsHerTease (talk) 06:49, 26 September 2022 (UTC)


 * ✅: Based on List of epidemics, there is a margin of error involved. It is generally accepted that the Black Death circa 1350 was the deadliest pandemic in recorded human history, but second, third and fourth place depend on the accuracy of the estimates for Spanish Flu and the Plague of Justinian. It is also worth noting that the mortality rate of a pandemic is perhaps more important than the actual number of deaths, as the world's population was far smaller in ancient and medieval times.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 08:34, 26 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Thank you! FillsHerTease (talk) 15:06, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 12 December 2022
Can you please say how severe the COVID-19 pandemic is in comparison with other modern pandemics? 134.124.93.198 (talk) 17:11, 12 December 2022 (UTC)


 * According to List of epidemics, Spanish flu is the deadliest modern pandemic by a considerable margin. Its mortality rate was also much higher than COVID-19. I'm not sure if this is needed in the article, what do others think?-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 18:07, 12 December 2022 (UTC)
 * On the Wikipedia page of all other modern pandemics there's a table comparing them to one another. On a severity scale from 1 to 5, with 5 being the most severe, the Asiatic flu (1889-1890) ranked 2 in severity, as did the Asian flu (1957-1958) and the Hong Kong flu (1968-1969), while the swine flu (2009-2010) ranked 1 and the Spanish flu ranked 5.  If only that table could be put on the COVID-19 wikipedia page, and if only COVID-19 could be included in the table of severity on the wikipedia pages of all other modern pandemics, I'm guessing that COVID-19 would be ranked 4 in severity when compared to other modern pandemics.  You'll see what I mean if you look at the wikipedia pages of all other modern pandemics.  On each of those wikipedia pages there's a table comparing it to all other modern pandemics.  Yet COVID-19 isn't on there.  Please put a table like that on the COVID-19 wikipedia page, and please include COVID-19 in the table section on the wikipedia pages whereby the pandemic on the wikipedia page is compared to other modern pandemics. 134.124.93.198 (talk) 04:51, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
 * The key difference is the mortality rate. Spanish flu is believed to have killed up to 5% of the world's population, while COVID-19 is rated at 0.1–0.4%. In terms of the amount of disruption that it has caused to everyday life, COVID-19 easily ranks as the most serious pandemic, but it hasn't been as deadly.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 13:04, 13 December 2022 (UTC)
 * You've probably seen the table (chart) on the Spanish flu wikipedia page comparing it to other modern pandemics. Can you please put COVID-19 in that table? 146.163.157.122 (talk) 03:28, 14 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Another key difference is that COVID-19 is still active. It is widely believed that when China gives up on its lockdown-on-sight policy, the mortality will rocket because the vaccination takeup is still too low and there are nothing like enough ICU beds. It is only with the benefit of hindsight (ten years after?) that any reliable source will put a firm figure on the world total. --𝕁𝕄𝔽 (talk) 17:11, 13 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Given the massive changes in medical science and treatment regimes over the period we're discussing, comparing and ranking pandemics by severity, or anything else, really is rather pointless. HiLo48 (talk) 07:07, 14 December 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: Research Seminar in Digital and Public History
— Assignment last updated by Galaxysword (talk) 20:41, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

Preventing racism?
The term Spanish flu is considered derogatory and offensive by 50% of the world.

Why not change the name from Spanish Flu to 1918 Avian flu pandemic?

Doctors already changed the name Wuhan virus/Coronavirus to Covid 19 to prevent racism and anti Corona beer sentiment.

Doctors already changed the name MonkeyPox to MPox to prevent racism.

Or at least add a trigger warning at the top of the wikipedia page to prevent outrage.

76.98.200.126 (talk) 12:59, 26 May 2023 (UTC)


 * This has been discussed extensively, and the most recent discussion in November 2022 decided to stick with the current title, although personally I would have gone for 1918 flu pandemic as this has been the standard name in medical and academic sources for many years. Wikipedia does not do trigger warnings, it is an encyclopedia based on what reliable sources say. The opening paragraph makes clear that Spanish flu is a misnomer.-- ♦Ian Ma c M♦  (talk to me) 15:22, 26 May 2023 (UTC)