Skip to 0 minutes and 11 seconds The first World War killed around 16 million people across the globe. Nearly half of them civilians. But just as that was drawing to a close, an even greater catastrophe occurred. An extremely virulent form of influenza began to spread around the world. Within two years, at least 40 million people had died of this disease, and possibly as many as 100 million. That’s over five times as many as had been killed as a result of the war. My name is Derek Gatherer, and I’m going to be your guide through the material we will be covering in this course all about influenza. Or as most of us call it, the flu.
Skip to 0 minutes and 46 seconds For those of us who live in the colder parts of the world, one of the ways we notice that winter is approaching is that people start sneezing. Many people will be convinced that they’ve caught the flu, but at least in the early part of the winter, that won’t be the case. The flu doesn’t usually arrive in the colder parts of the northern hemisphere until about Christmas time or January. For those who live in the southern hemisphere, you will see the flu arriving around July. This is what we call seasonal influenza. In recent decades, we’ve had the option of vaccination against seasonal flu. And flu vaccination will be one of the topics we’ll look at in more detail.
Skip to 1 minute and 21 seconds From time to time, a pandemic flu strain will appear. That’s an outbreak that has global coverage. Like the flu outbreak of 1918, but perhaps less severe. Where pandemics come from, and how they change and seasonal flus, in other words, how the flu virus evolves, will be one of our main topics in the course. As well as studying the public health aspects of influenza, we will be looking in some detail of the virus itself. its structure, its life cycle, and many other aspects of its basic biology. And by learning about flu viruses, you will acquire a body of knowledge that will also help your general understanding of other viral diseases. Things like AIDS, Ebola, measles, rabies, and polio.
Skip to 2 minutes and 0 seconds These viruses together kill several million people across the world every year. So viruses are important to all of us, and they’re likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. Whether you’re a health professional, a student of biology, or an interested member of the public, this course I hope will contain something of interest to you. So I look forward to joining you on this Lancaster University course for influenza.
