Initial Capabilities of the United States

Abstract

Epidemics of cholera, smallpox, typhus, yellow fever, and many other bacterial diseases existed in the United States during the nineteenth century. As treatments and vaccines developed, they were less common (Bynun et al. 2006). The Spanish Influenza of 1918/19, however, presented a challenge because a virus was highly contagious. Some lessons learned from the Spanish flu (masks, social distancing, etc.) applied when Covid-19 became an epidemic in 2020 (Gupta 2021), but other lessons had been lost.