History

The Spanish Influenza in 1918 killed an estimated 40-50 million people.

 The next pandemic in 1957; the Asian influenza caused around 2 million deaths.

The most recent pandemic in 1968, the Hong Kong influenza killed approximately 1 million people.

Between 1997 and 2006 several new strains have appeared: H5N1, H9N2, H7N2, H7N3 and H10N7, all of which have pandemic potential.

The H5N1 strain has so far caused the most human cases and bears the highest resemblance to the deadly 1918 strain.

The current threat is now a grave concern to governments around the world. Pandemic influenza occurs periodically (about every thirty years) and can have devastating consequences on a worldwide scale. The 1918 outbreak of Spanish Influenza, thought by experts to be closely comparable to that of current prediction, is estimated to have caused up to 50 million deaths worldwide. Research cited on the World Health Organisation (WHO) website concludes that this outbreak of Spanish flu was entirely avian and had some similarities with the current H5N1 bird flu virus.