"The 1918 mortality numbers alone do not adequately describe the disaster. It was not just the weak and infirm who were taken away but the flower and strength of the land. The age-specific mortality curve did not trace the “U” describe above, but resembled a “W” with very high mortality rates in healthy young adults aged 20-40 years as well as in those less than 5 years of age and those aged 65 years and older (figure 1). No adequate explanation of this mortality pattern has been presented. It was wartime and young men were crowded together in military camps, but the mortality has highest in men of the same age who remained at home. Pregnancy was a risk factor, and this may provide some explanation for the high mortality in young women (23, 24). The fulminant nature of the clinical course of the fatal pneumonia casessuggests the the virus itself possessed a virulence not seen before nor since."