INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC.

Taranaki Daily News, 30 January 1919, Page 2

INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC.

SPREADING IN AUSTRALIA, Sydney, Jan. 29. The Government is appealing to every person to wear a mask and protect the nation from the great scourge.

Three fresh cases of influenza are reported. All the victims were recently in Melbourne. A further case has been discovered at Millthorpe. The proclamation closes all public telephones in the city. Adelaide, Jan. 29. Twenty influenza caees are reported in the city.

SPREAD OF THE EPIDEMIC, AN AMERICAN THEORY. Ih the latter part of 1910 the pneu-monic-influenza first appeared in Harbin, a town in Manchuria, under Chinese control, says the New York World. Harbin is on the Trans-Siberian railroad, and was the original hotbed of disease. It was believed that influenza was carried into Harbin by fur dealers, and by Chinese laborers returning to their homes to celebrate New Year's Day. From Harbin the disease rapidly Bpread in all directions, usually following the lines of traffic along the railroads. By January 24, 1011, a total of 1500 Chinese and 27 Europeans, two of whom were physicians and one an assistant had died, and nearly every case proved fatal.

Wherever the Chinese coolies from the north have travelled they have carried this disease. From 1010 up to 1917 China has not been free from it.

In the early part of 1917 about 200,000 Chinese coolies, collected from the northern part of China, where pneumo-nic-influenza has raged at intervals siiice 1910, were sent to France as laborers. They made splendid laborers in France, and were in back of the lines during the German advance of March, 1018. No doubt many of them were captured by the Germans at that time. Hence the outbreak of the disease in the German Army. The disease first broke out last spring in the German army, where it is said to have been very serious. We next heard of it in Spain, hence the name Spanish influenza. The name ia really a misnomer, but it has stuck, probably because it is the first epidemic of influenza Spain has ever had.