The Efficiency of Bacterial Vaccines on Mortality during the ‘Spanish’ Influenza Pandemic of 1918–19

The worldwide ‘Spanish’ influenza pandemic of 1918–19, which extended into the 1920s, infected more than a third of the world’s population and killed an estimated 50–100 million people, more than the civilian and military casualties of World War I. Present-day medical scholars, journalists, and other commentators have often ignored, downplayed or treated with scepticism the role of bacterial vaccines in reducing mortality during the pandemic. There have been repeated claims in this century that these vaccines were ‘useless’, ‘concocted’, and possibly harmful. Focussing on the Australian scene, I show that bacterial vaccines from reputable sources did indeed reduce mortality, perhaps to a greater extent in some cases than modern anti-viral influenza vaccines.