1918 Flu Pandemic

I read The Great Influenza by John M. Barry at the beginning of the year. Wow, did it scare me. But it was very, very interesting and has convinced me of the importance of vaccines.

There is new light on why so many people may have died so quickly and so violently. Aspirin overdose.

The Journal of the American Medical Association suggested a dose of 1,000 milligrams every three hours, the equivalent of almost 25 standard 325-milligram aspirin tablets in 24 hours. This is about twice the daily dosage generally considered safe today.

The pharmacology of aspirin is complex and was not fully understood until the 1960s, but dosage is crucial. Doubling the dose given at six-hour intervals can cause a 400 percent increase in the amount of the medicine that remains in the body. Even quite low daily doses — six to nine standard aspirin pills a day for several days — can lead to dangerously high blood levels of the drug in some people.

Hmm. Quite an interesting lead. It's very possible that some people took 2, 3, even 4 times the recommendation to avoid death from the flu. As they say in the article, it's probably not the reason for most deaths but can explain some, particularly deaths of the young and very healthy.