More Deadly Than War – by Kenneth C. Davis (2018)

Why did they not teach us about the Spanish influenza when I was growing up in school? I don’t remember history teachers even mentioning it. The answer is on page 204 in this book:
“After the twin horrors of world war and the Spanish flu, many Americans longed for a return to normalcy – a word used by President Warren G. Harding in his successful 1920 campaign for the presidency. It may be one of the reasons that very few people wrote talked about the Spanish flu and that it largely disappeared from public memory – becoming a piece of hidden history.”

The Spanish influenza lasted a few years, then vanished as mysteriously as it had appeared. Everyone said, “Thank God it’s done!” and then did their best to forget how devastating it had been. No one wants to think about something that killed millions of people indiscriminately. It killed upwards of 50 million people worldwide (some estimates go as high as 100 million). But what if it suddenly re-appeared?