Die Spanische Grippe in der Zeit des Mangels und politischen Umsturzes – eine Prager Erfahrung

Abstract

Abstract Also in the Bohemian countries the second wave of the Spanish flu in the autumn of 1918 proved to be extremely virulent and lethal. As demonstrated by the example of Prague, until its end the people did not really care about the pandemic, and very soon it was pushed out of the public sphere by the then existing supply crisis as well as by the founding of the Czechoslovakian Republic in October, 1918. This fact is also reflected by the popular culture (anecdotes, comic songs). Furthermore, the Spanish flu was no catalyst of social protests, which were rather based on the anti-Semitic or anti-German narratives of the Czech national society.