Spanish flu nursing ward. Nurses and doctors with face masks attending to patients with Spanish influenza. The 1918 Spanish influenza pandemic,which occurred in several waves between 1918 and 1920,infected one fifth of the world population and killed between 20 and 50 million,more than had been killed in the First World War. The second wave of the pandemic,from August 1918,was much deadlier than the first,with high mortality rates among young healthy adults including soldiers. Photographed in November 1918,at the United States Naval Hospital (USNH) on Mare Island,California,USA |