1918 Influenza part 1

  So I'm reading, "Flu, the untold Story of the great influenza pandemic of 1918, and the search for the virus that caused it", by Gina Kolata.  I'm a few chapters in.  I started reading it, because there seems to be a mystery surrounding this particular flu, if it was indeed a flu at all.  Anyhow, I came across something interesting today.
    In the chapter on Swine Flu, page 136 there is an analysis of the 1976 flu outbreak at Fort Dix.  This is what the officials are basing their evidence of a new and deadly pandemic, related to the 1918 flu, and starts the vaccine campaign. pg 136- "One death, thirteen sick men and up to 500 recruits who evidently had caught and resisted the disease, all in on Army camp, were the only established instances of human-to-human swine flu found around the world as February turned into March, the last month of the flu season in the Northern Hemisphere."   The scientists could not compare the Fort Dix virus to the 1918 flu virus, because no one had any samples for comparison.  So, they are basing a possible future epidemic on what then???



  Now, there was a man named Dr. Russell Alexander, who was also party to the vaccine meetings taking place.  He asked this question to the meeting, (pg 142), "What information might make the group change it's mind about the need to prepare to immunize the nation against the swine flu?  Would it be evidence that every swine flu case was mild?  Or that no one but the Fort Dix soldiers got the swine flu?  Would it make a difference what the timing of the outbreaks was or where they occurred?"  And his questions became ignored to the group.
  Dr. Alexander continues to lay caution, and on pg 143, states, "My view is that you should be conservative about putting foreign material into the human body.  That's always true-especially when you are talking about 200 million bodies.  The need should be estimated conservatively.  If you don't need to give it, don't."
  So this small group of scientists and doctors effectively bully President Ford into asking Congress for $135 million for the production of a vaccine, for a disease that no one could even prove to exist. (pg150)

  That's as far as I've gotten so far.  The layout has been that no one knows what the 1918 disease was, really, though it is called influenza.  The flu virus mutates, or changes yearly, and supposedly every decade, undergoes a major change, causing a massive epidemic.  And at this point in the book-obviously, there is push for a vaccine to be made, based on the theory of the next flu season being one related to the 1918 virus-but no one knows that.
  What's interesting, if you read the science, certain folks of various ages do have immunity to influenza strains.  Yet, each year, the health department calls for mass immunization of all ages, sick or not sick.  Without knowing who has immunity already.  Without knowing the effects of injecting the virus into those folks.  Injecting the virus into infants, children and others with underlying conditions.  Nothing about the flu vaccine is conservative.  It wasn't back in 1976, as Dr. Alexander is cautioning for, and it isn't today.  What's it going to take?

 (As far as correct info, I haven't rechecked the info in the book yet, but thought it was of interest)
Part 2 to follow at some point :)