ЧЕТВРТИ ТАЛАС ПАНДЕМИЈЕ ШПАНСКЕ ГРОЗНИЦЕ У СРБИЈИ 1919–1920. ГОДИНЕ
THE FOURTH WAVE OF THE SPANISH FLU PANDEMIC IN SERBIA IN 1919 AND 1920

Summary/Abstract: During the last year of the First World War, a pandemic of Spanish fever spread throughout the world. It is estimated that it took about 50 million lives. The pandemic did not bypass Serbia and about 3%, which is more than 100,000 inhabitants, died from it. The main pandemic strike began at the end of the winter of 1918, and it ended in the early spring of 1919. This pandemic strike had three waves: the first, spring-summer wave, was weak and relatively harmless. The second, autumn wave, was extremely mortal, and the third, winter wave, was with significantly lower mortality compared to the autumn wave. Shorter intervals of several weeks were noticed between these waves. More than half a year after the end of the third wave, during the winter of years 1919 to 1920, at the time common for the seasonal outbreak of influenza, a new outbreak of Spanish flu was registered. It is classified as the fourth wave. The aim of this work is to determine the occurrence of the fourth wave of the Spanish flu pandemic in Serbia on the basis of available historical sources and primarily death registers. Research pointed that the fourth wave of the world pandemic did not bypass Serbia. On the territories where the consequences of the second wave were extremely hard, in the average number for Serbia or above them, consequences of the fourth rush were mild, comparatively similar, even though bigger in relation to the consequences of the third wave. On the contrary, on the territories where the second wave of the pandemic had relevantly smaller consequences than the average, contagiousness was smaller, the third and the fourth wave were much mortal, but obviously milder than the second, regarding the fact that the fourth wave was much more mortal than the third. When the fourth wave of the Spanish fever pandemic finished, during following winters, extreme rushes of season flu were noticed and its cause was mutated Spanish flu virus.

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