US Covid-19 death toll on verge of surpassing that of 1918 Spanish flu
- Covid-related US deaths nearing 675,000, according to Johns Hopkins University
- The Delta variant represents 99.4 per cent of US coronavirus cases
The United States’ reported death toll from Covid-19 will this week surpass the number of dead from the Spanish flu, according to the side-by-side numbers – though a direct comparison between the raw numbers doesn’t give the whole story, medical experts and statisticians say.
What is clear is that the sheer numbers, given the modern-day tools that combat such illnesses, are a heavy burden. Covid-related US deaths as of Sunday night were at 673,763, according to Johns Hopkins University data.
That’s just over 1,200 fewer that died in the 1918 Spanish flu, which took an estimated 675,000 lives in the US. Before this, that flu pandemic was the most lethal since the United States was formed. With an 1,800-per-day death average, the number who’ve died of Covid-19 could surpass the previous scourge by Monday or Tuesday.
There are differences between the two scenarios. In 1918, the US population was just over 100 million, whereas it’s 330 million today, as The Washington Post points out. That makes the death rate one-in-500 Americans as opposed to the 1918 toll of one-in-150.
Globally, the number is 4.7 million dead so far, which is much lower than the worldwide 50 million who died in 1918 and 1919 from the Spanish flu, as Fortune noted. But unlike the two-year period that the Spanish flu ravaged humanity’s ranks, Covid-19 is not even close to quitting.