In the face of Covid‐19, we can look at the past disease outbreaks to find parallels and learn lessons that can be applied today to better respond to the current crisis. We investigated
a 20‐year period from 1911 to 1930 which includes the 1918‐19 influenza pandemic known as the
“Spanish flu”. We followed the daily death tolls and in particular analysed deaths in excess of what
we would expect – we used the same manner as is currently done to track the spread of the Covid‐
19 pandemic
