Scientists Warn Of Repeat Of 1918 Flu Outbreak Killed 40 Million Worldwide; Research Shows Strain Originated In Pigs

Scientists’ first direct look at the 1918 flu virus that killed up to 40 million people worldwide reveals it is unlike any other known human influenza virus. But they say an equally deadly strain could emerge again.

In a paper published today in the journal Science, researchers at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington show that the 1918 virus originated in pigs, like other new human flu strains, rather than directly from ducks or other waterfowl, as some have hypothesized to explain the virus’s extraordinary virulence.

In other words, the killer virus arose through usual channels and not from an unlikely aberrant pathway.

“This certainly could happen again,” said Dr. Jeffrey K. Taubenberger, a member of the team that has provided the first direct evidence on the 1918 virus’s genetic makeup.

Taubenberger and his co-workers isolated pieces of the flu virus’s genetic material from a lung of a 21-year-old Army private who died during the height of the flu pandemic - on Sept. 26, 1918, a week after he had become ill. Lung tissue from the soldier and several dozen other victims has been preserved in formaldehyde at the Armed Forces Institute for 78 years.

The researchers were able to piece together fragments of five different genes from the killer flu strain, less than 10 percent of the virus’s genome. But that was enough to determine its swine origins and also set it apart from all other known human flu viruses.

However, it is not enough to explain the organism’s unique ability to kill. For that, the Armed Forces Institute researchers hope to compile a more complete picture of the virus’s genome.