Onion a day keeps the flu away
Nearly 100 years ago, an outbreak of Spanish Influenza gripped the world. The influenza outbreak of 1918 was deemed the last major global epidemic,
Lethbridge was not immune to the Spanish Flu epidemic. At the end of the First World War, Canadian troops returned home and many brought the flu with them. Soldiers landed in Quebec City, then travelled by train to various destinations across the country.
Lethbridge had its first confirmed case of influenza on Oct. 11, 1918. The epidemic lasted 106 days, finally ending in January 1919; however, another outbreak occurred in April. Out of a population of roughly 10,000, there were 2,578 reported cases of the flu in Lethbridge alone. In total, the influenza outbreak killed 129 Lethbridgians.
During the height of the epidemic, public meetings were prohibited, local stores could not open until noon and wearing a mask outdoors became essential. Fear consumed the city. Medical facilities in Lethbridge quickly transitioned into flu containment centres. The original Isolation Hospital, built in 1907, provided medical care for locals suffering from the virus.
In 1918, Lethbridge’s Dainty Private Maternity Hospital was converted into a general infirmary in order to help fluridden patients. A boarding housekeeper named Mrs. Andrew Maloney, who worked at the Lethbridge Research Station, fed her guests raw onions one to three times a day. Fascinatingly, none of Mrs. Maloney’s boarders contracted the illness.
The Spanish Influenza was no normal virus, striking down young adults between the ages of 20 and 30. By the end of 1918, in Canada alone, one out of six contracted the illness and 52,000 died.
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