Pathogens, Pauperisation And The Protectorate (Part 2)

By 1992 what is commonly regarded as the world’s first modern viral pandemic, the “Russian Influenza,” had also arrived in the region.

Carried by railways and steam ships, between 1889 and 1890 the pestilence spread rapidly killing about one million people globally. The aetiology of the pandemic is uncertain. For many years researchers had sought to link it with subsequent pandemics through analysis of anti-bodies in elderly people. This resulted in a 1999 study indicating that an Influenza A subtype H3, with the H3N8 suggested as the most likely candidate.