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The Spanish Flu in Aotearoa
In the closing days of World War One a new influenza virus appeared in America and sailed with soldiers bound for France. By October 1918 it would be in New Zealand.
The 1918 Spanish Flu caused Aotearoa's worst ever natural disaster, with a loss of 9,000 lives.
War incubates a new disease
When Spanish Flu arrived in New Zealand, a milder strain of influenza was already circulating around the country, causing illness but little death. This first wave of flu would offer some protection from the more virulent strain that was to follow, but thanks to war in Europe, this mild disease would mutate into something far more deadly, especially to young adults in an age without antibiotics.
World War One had created the perfect conditions for the cultivation and spread of stronger mutations of the influenza virus. Troops returning from Europe brought the more deadly strain of flu with them. As they dispersed across New Zealand, so did influenza – to troop camps, ports, towns and cities. Auckland was the first affected, followed by Wellington. By early November 1918, both cities had been brought to their knees with huge numbers of infections.
Public services collapse
In Auckland alone, 180 nurses caught the flu, filling three hospital wards. A quarter of Auckland’s school children were sick. By early November, 80 per cent of staff at the city’s telephone exchange were home with flu. One chemist reported 700 customers buying remedies in one day.
The acting chief health officer Dr Joseph Frengley, travelled to Auckland from Wellington to assess the situation. He issued health advice via newspapers, ordered the closure of all public places, and imposed travel restrictions up and down the country. On 6 November 1918, a public health emergency was declared.
Flu spreads to the Pacific
While Australia and American Samoa quarantined returning ships and stopped the virus at their borders, New Zealand did not.
Western Samoa, a New Zealand protectorate, was among the worst affected. On 7 November, the steam ship Talune arrived in Samoa having stopped to collect workers in Fiji along the way. Quarantine inspection by New Zealand officials was cursory, despite sick people on board and reports of an epidemic in New Zealand. Passengers were allowed to disembark, and the vessel to carry on to other islands where it continued to spread Spanish Flu.
The flu that came with the Talune led to 8,500 deaths – a fifth of the Samoan population. With so many sick and dead, a famine swiftly followed. The Samoan population dropped by a third between 1917 and 1920. To this day, memories of New Zealand’s failure to protect Samoans from the Spanish Flu, are still held strong.
