how did other countries help india at the time of pandemic spanish flu in 1918-1919
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918 flu pandemic in India was the outbreak of an unusually deadly influenza pandemic in India between 1918-1920 as a part of the worldwide Spanish flu pandemic. Also referred to as the Bombay Influenza or the Bombay Fever in India,[1][2] the pandemic is believed to have killed up to 14 -17 million people in the country, the most among all countries.[3][4] David Arnold (2019) estimates at least 12 million dead, about 5% of the population.[5] The death toll in India's British-ruled districts was 13.88 million.[6]
In India, the pandemic broke out in Bombay in June 1918,[7][8] with one of the possible routes being via ships carrying troops returning from the First World War in Europe.[9][7] The outbreak then spread across the country from west and south to east and north,[9] reaching the whole of the country by August.[10] It hit different parts of the country in three waves with the second wave being the highest in mortality rate.[7][10] The death rate peaked in the last week of September 1918 in Bombay, in the middle of October in Madras, and in the middle of November in Calcutta.[8]
The outbreak most severely affected younger people in the age group of 20 - 40, with women suffering disproportionately.[10] According to the Sanitary Commissioner's report for 1918, the maximum death toll in a week exceeded 200 deaths in both Bombay and Madras.[8] The spread of the disease was exacerbated by a failed monsoon and the resultant famine-like conditions, that had left people underfed and weak, and forced them to move into densely populated cities.[2] As a result of the severity of the outbreak, the year 1919 saw a reduction of births by around 30 percent.[10] The population growth of India during the decade from 1911-1921 was 1.2%, the lowest among all decades under the British Raj. In his memoirs the Hindi poet, Suryakant Tripathi, wrote "Ganga was swollen with dead bodies." The sanitary commissioner's report for 1918 also noted that all rivers across India were clogged up with bodies,[7] because of a shortage of firewood for cremation
Mahatma Gandhi, the leader of India's independence struggle, was also infected by the virus.[4] The pandemic had a significant influence in the freedom movement in the country. The healthcare system in the country was unable to meet the sudden increase in demands for medical attention. The consequent toll of death and misery, and economic fallout brought about by the pandemic led to an increase in emotion against colonial rule.[4][7]
answer with explanation
The 1918 pandemic and its impact to the country
Contrary to its name, the ‘Spanish’ flu that swept the globe in 1918 seems to have originated in the United States. Some of the earliest recorded cases of the virus were among army recruits in Kansas in the US, in March 1918. The virus seems to have then spread eastward across Europe, and then to the rest of the world from Northern France in April 1918, reaching India and China in June. Given that the pandemic swept the world during the First World War, troop movements, amply aided by transportation, via railways and steamships acted as an important conduit for its transmission.
The pandemic itself struck in two waves, broadly. The first was a mild wave that lasted until July, while the second, more virulent, wave began in late August and continued into 1919. The second wave of the disease was one of the most lethal pandemics to have swept the world, accounting for a global death tally running into tens of millions of people.
Complications to the respiratory tract and lungs were considered to be the key reason for a number of such deaths. British India (including modern day Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar) was the region that saw the most number of causalities due to the pandemic, with the estimated number of deaths between 12.5 and 20 million people (close to half of all deaths due to the pandemic). British India was followed by China which was witness to between four to nine and a half million deaths and Sub-Saharan Africa, which saw between 1.7 and two million deaths. In this sense, the 1918 influenza pandemic affected the poorer countries and regions more severely than the richer ones.
Even within countries, it was the poor and the deprived that bore the brunt of the disease, as examples from British India will amply indicate. In 1918, vast parts of India faced famine-like conditions following the failure of the south-west monsoon. Famine was officially declared in two Indian provinces- Central Provinces (includes parts of today’s Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh) and the United Provinces (today’s Uttar Pradesh)- while the lack of rains also seriously affected areas in Bombay presidency. These famine-stricken regions were also the most severely affected by the disease.
For instance, the Central Provinces registered the highest mortality per 1000 people due to the disease at 67.6, followed by the Bombay Presidency at 54.3 and the United Provinces at 47.2. The corresponding rates for Madras Presidency (15.8) and Lower Burma (16.2) were in the range of the global average rate of between 13.6 and 21.7 per 1000 people.
The economic strain due to war-time inflation and commodity shortages further exacerbated these difficulties by making essential commodities such as food and kerosene dearer, and thus beyond the reach of the vast majority of the population. Although not directly related to the disease, parts of Madras Presidency witnessed food riots in September 1918, indicating the extent of economic deprivation that was rife among the Indian population of that period. The mortality statistics of Bombay city in late 1918 provide more clinching evidence of the differential impact of the disease on the country’s poor and deprived sections. The category ‘low-caste Hindus’ – which refers to the socially oppressed sections in India – registered the highest case specific mortality rate per 1000 people in the city at 61.6; a number much higher than the average rate for the remaining categories of people, which stood at 14.35. The numbers certainly indicate who the most likely victims of an epidemic disease will be. Therefore, any relief effort during such epidemics should be specially geared towards increasing access of food and essential commodities to these sections if a catastrophe of the magnitude of the 1918 flu is to be avoided.
Although there did not seem to be any economically disruptive ‘lockdowns’ in 1918, the period had its fair share of serious economic dislocations, as workers and professionals were incapacitated by the disease. the ‘Spanish’ flu in India severely affected people in the working age group who were between 20 and 40 years of age. From mines to textile manufacturing units and agricultural fields to the docks, workers belonging to most sectors of the Indian economy were directly affected by the disease. In Bombay presidency, the aforementioned monsoon failure and the reduction in workforce that this illness lead to meant a 19% reduction in the area under food crop cultivation, thus contributing further to food shortage in the country. The pandemic left deep scars on an already battered war-time Indian economy.