Is COVID-19 as Lethal as the Spanish Flu? The Australian Experience in 1919 and 2020 and the Role of Nonpharmaceutical Interventions (NPIs).

We conducted a comparative historical study to interrogate Professor Peter Doherty's warning to Australians in April 2020 that 'COVID-19 is just as lethal as the Spanish flu'. We identified the epicentres of both pandemics, namely, metropolitan Sydney in 1919 and metropolitan Melbourne in 2020 and compared the lethality of the Spanish Flu and COVID-19 in these two cities. Lethality was measured by the number and rate of hospital admissions, death rates, age-specific death rates and age-standardised mortality rates (ASMRs). Using these measures, we demonstrated the strikingly different waves of infection, their severity at various points in time and the cumulative impact of the viruses by the end of our study period, i.e., 30 September in 1919 and 2020. Hospital admissions and deaths from the Spanish Flu in 1919 were more than 30 times higher than those for COVID-19 in 2020. The ASMR per 100,000 population for the Spanish Flu was 383 compared to 7 for COVID-19: The former was about 55 times higher than the latter. These results suggest that the Spanish Flu was more lethal than COVID-19. Professor Doherty's warning was perhaps taken seriously and that partly explains the findings of this study. Containing infection in 1919 and 2020 threw the burden on nonpharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) such as 'protective sequestration' (quarantine), contact tracing, lockdowns and masks. It is likely that the persistent and detailed contact tracing scheme provides the best possible explanation for why NPIs in 2020 were more effective than in 1919 and therefore contributed to the lower lethality of the COVID-19 pandemic in its first year.

Dystocia in cattle and horses: a compilation of historical artworks dedicated to Professor Gerhard Sand (1861-1921).

Professor Gerhard Sand (1861-1921) was the first professor of veterinary obstetrics at the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University, Copenhagen, Denmark. He began teaching the theory and practice of obstetrics to veterinary students in 1887 and spent the following years until his death in 1921 developing the veterinary obstetrics teaching program. During this period, veterinary obstetrics was established as an independent discipline at the Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University. Professor Sand's teaching had a major impact on the field of veterinary obstetrics in Scandinavia. He was devoted to teaching veterinary obstetrics and produced a number of obstetrical illustrations, some of which showed different causes of dystocia, mainly fetal malpresentation in cattle and horses. Professor Sand created the illustrations with the intention of publishing a handbook of obstetrics, but due to illness and an early death, this work was never completed. This compilation of historical artworks of dystocia in cattle and horses includes some of these illustrations and is published to honour Professor Sand, with the intention of making his illustrations widely available for the teaching of veterinary obstetrics.

Trayectoria del trastorno formal del pensamiento, desde la observación clínica al análisis computacional / Trajectory of formal thought disorder, from clinical observation to computational analysis

La adecuada comprensión de un término psicopatológico requiere, no solo del conocimiento de la alteración descrita, sino también de los contextos y conceptos a partir de los cuales fue acuñado y de la transformación de los mismos a lo largo del tiempo. En el caso del trastorno formal del pensamiento se describe su evolución desde su incorporación a la psicopatología con fines puramente descriptivos y asociado a la influencia del asociacionismo y a la idea de una dependencia directa entre pensamiento y lenguaje hasta la actualidad, en que el uso de herramientas computacionales y de hipótesis provenientes de la lingüística han promovido su uso como instrumento diagnóstico y marcador pronóstico, al tiempo que ha significado la incorporación de nueva terminología. (AU)

Properly understanding a psychopathological term requires knowledge of the disorder described, the contexts and concepts from which it was coined, and its modification over time. In the case of formal thought disorder, we describe its evolution from its incorporation into psychopathology for purely descriptive purposes and associated with the influence of associationism and the idea of a direct dependence between thought and language to the present day, in which the use of computational tools and hypotheses from linguistics have promoted its use as a diagnostic tool and prognostic marker, while simultaneously leading to the incorporation of new terminology. (AU)

Juan Vegue Martín (1884-ca. 1949). Del Guijuelo salmantino a la Guinea española / Juan Vegue Martín (1884-ca. 1949). From the Guijuelo’s region to Spanish Guinea

Utilizando como fuente principal la documentación conservada en los Colegios Oficiales de Farmacéuticos de Madrid y Toledo, la Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, la sección de África en el Archivo General de la Administración y la prensa períodica local, en particular la impresa en Salamanca y Santa Isabel (Guinea), reconstruimos la biografía del farmacéutico Juan Vegue Martín, desde su tierra natal en la comarca salmantina de Guijuelo hasta los últimos datos conocidos, en los territorios coloniales de la Guinea Española. Una biografía que puede servir como estudio de caso para otros farmacéuticos rurales, de vida nómada, que vivieron -y sufrieron- los años de la Guerra Civil española.(AU)

Using as main source the documentation kept in the Official Colleges of Pharmacists of Madrid and Toledo, the University of Santiago de Compostela, the section of Africa in the General Archive of the Administration and the local periodical press, particularly the one printed in Salamanca and Santa Isabel (Guinea), we reconstruct the biography of the pharmacist Juan Vegue Martín, from his homeland in the Guijuelo region of Salamanca to the latest known data, in the colonial territories of Spanish Guinea. A biography that can serve as a case study for other rural pharmacists, with a nomadic life, who lived through -and suffered- the years of the Spanish Civil War.(AU)

"Resistance leads to self-destruction": how an (a)political strategy helped Karl von Frisch succeed during the Nazi era.

Karl von Frisch, one of the leading zoologists of the twentieth century and co-founder of the Journal of Comparative Physiology A, has been frequently portrayed as an opponent of the Nazi regime because he, as a 'quarter-Jew,' faced the threat of forced retirement from his position as a professor at the University of Munich during the Third Reich. However, doubts about an active opposition role have surfaced in recent years. A litmus test for assessing the validity of this notion is provided by our discovery that four of the six core members of the anti-Nazi resistance group 'White Rose'-Sophie Scholl, Hans Scholl, Christoph Probst, and Alexander Schmorell-were his students. When they were arrested, sentenced to death, and executed, he seemed to ignore this historic event, both during and after World War II-in line with his belief that resistance leads to self-destruction, and research can flourish only by ignoring what happens around oneself. On the other hand, this seemingly apolitical attitude did not prevent him from making use of politics when it served his interests. Such actions included his (pseudo-)scientific justification of forced sterilization of people suffering from hereditary disorders during the Third Reich and his praise of the Nazi government's efforts to "keep races pure." As unsettling as these and some other political views and actions of Karl von Frisch are, they enabled him to carry out several critical pieces of his research agenda during the Third Reich, which three decades later earned him a Nobel Prize.

Hypoxia and Activation of Neutrophil Degranulation-Related Genes in the Peripheral Blood of COVID-19 Patients.

Severe COVID-19 is characterized by systematic hyper-inflammation and subsequent damage to various organs. Therefore, it is critical to trace this cascade of hyper-inflammation. Blood transcriptome has been routinely utilized in the interrogation of host immune response in COVID-19 and other infectious conditions. In this study, consensus gene dysregulation in the blood was obtained from 13 independent transcriptome studies on COVID-19. Among the up-regulated genes, the most prominent functional categories were neutrophil degranulation and cell cycle, which is clearly different from the classical activation of interferon signaling pathway in seasonal flu. As for the potential upstream causal factors of the atypical gene dysregulation, systemic hypoxia was further examined because it is much more widely reported in COVID-19 than that in seasonal flu. It was found that both physiological and pathological hypoxia can induce activation of neutrophil degranulation-related genes in the blood. Furthermore, COVID-19 patients with different requirement for oxygen intervention showed distinctive levels of gene expression related to neutrophil degranulation in the whole blood, which was validated in isolated neutrophils. Thus, activation of neutrophil degranulation-related genes in the blood of COVID-19 could be partially attributed to hypoxia. Interestingly, similar pattern was also observed in H1N1 infection (the cause of Spanish flu) and several other severe respiratory viral infections. As for the molecular mechanism, both HIF-dependent and HIF-independent pathways have been examined. Since the activation of neutrophil degranulation-related genes is highly correlated with disease severity in COVID-19, early detection of hypoxia and active intervention may prevent further activation of neutrophil degranulation-related genes and other harmful downstream hyper-inflammation. This common mechanism is applicable to current and future pandemic as well as the severe form of common respiratory infection.

La cultura compasiva en el abordaje de la poliomielitis en entornos sanitarios. El caso español (1940-1970) / Compassionate culture in addressing polio in healthcare settings. The spanish case (1940-1970)

La presencia de brotes epidémicos de poliomielitis en las décadas iniciales y centrales del siglo pasado constituyó un importante problema de Salud Pública, debido a la ausencia de tratamientos eficaces, por afectar de forma preferente a edades infantiles, en entornos con niveles aceptables de salubridad y por las temibles secuelas paralíticas. En este trabajo se intentan reconstruir algunas de las respuestas que se dieron en el estado español, tanto en los ámbitos profesionales sanitarios como desde planteamientos hete-rodoxos alternativos como el método Kenny, tomando como eje de referencia la cultura compasiva que estuvo detrás del desarrollo de las medidas adoptadas, así como su análisis crítico, en el periodo anterior a la puesta en marcha de las vacunas antipoliomielíticas.(AU)

The presence of epidemic outbreaks of poliomyelitis in the initial and central decades of the last century constituted an important Public Health problem due to the absence of effective treatments because it preferentially affected children, in environments with acceptable levels of health, and the fear of the paralytic sequelae. This work attempted to reconstruct some of the responses that were given in the Spanish state, both in professional health settings and from alternative heterodox approaches such as the Kenny method, taking as a reference axis the compassionate culture that was behind the development of the measures. adopted and their critical analysis, in the period before the implementation of anti-polio vaccines.(AU)

II Congreso Nacional de Pediatría. La lucha contra la mortalidad infantil / II National Congress of Paediatrics: The fight against child mortality

En el presente trabajo se presenta una aproximación a los contenidos de las ponencias del IICongreso Nacional de Pediatría, celebrado en San Sebastián en 1923, con ocasión del centenario del mismo. Se destaca como hilo conductor de las mismas el problema de la mortalidad infantil, que en aquellos años era muy elevada en España y era una preocupación de políticos, de intelectuales y de la clase médica. Se constata que alguna de las propuestas y preocupaciones de los pediatras que asistieron a dicho congreso siguen vigentes hoy en día.(AU)

In this work, we present an overview of the contents of the communications presented at the Second National Congress of Paediatrics, held in San Sebastian in 1923, on the occasion of the 100th year anniversary. The problem of infant mortality stands out as a common thread, which in those years was very high in Spain and was a concern of politicians, intellectuals and the medical profession. It is worth noting that some of the proposals and concerns of the paediatricians who attended that congress continue to be relevant today.(AU)

Enseñanza de la Anatomía Humana en la Universidad Austral de Chile: Pasado, Presente y Futuro / Teaching of Human Anatomy at the Universidad Austral de Chile: Past, Present and Future

La presente revisión narrativa trata de caracterizar como ha sido el proceso de enseñanza de la anatomía en la Universidad Austral de Chile (UACh), presentando una visión histórica desde los inicios de la Universidad a los tiempos actuales y una reflexión sobre el futuro de la Anatomía Humana. Se describen los orígenes del Instituto de Anatomía de la UACh, primeros académicos, logros institucionales, convenios interinstitucionales; además, se detallan los métodos y estrategias educativas utilizadas en la actualidad para la enseñanza anatómica y se presenta una visión panorámica del porvenir como instituto de docencia e investigación en el campo de la Anatomía humana.

SUMMARY: This narrative review tries to characterize how the anatomy teaching process has been carried out at the Universidad Austral de Chile (UACh), presenting a historical vision from the beginnings of the University to the present time and a reflection on the future of Human Anatomy. The origins of the Human Anatomy Institute at the UACh, first academics, institutional achievements, inter-institutional agreements are described; in addition, the educational methods and strategies currently used for anatomical teaching are detailed and a panoramic vision of the future as a teaching and research institute in the field of human anatomy is presented.

[Mandatory Reporting as the Basis of Epidemiological Statistics: The Impact of the Reporting Practice and Usage of Paper Technologies on the Informative Content of Morbidity Statistics 1886-1921]. / Die Meldepflicht als Grundlage der epidemiologischen Statistik: Die Auswirkungen der Meldepraxis und der Verwendung von paper technologies auf den Informationsgehalt von Morbiditätsstatistiken 1886­1921.

This article examines the impact of the reporting practice and paper technologies like forms on reports that were later used for national morbidity statistics by studying the Swiss reporting system for infectious diseases between 1886 and 1921. Analysing the production processes of notifications shows the difficulties and solutions in the implementation of the statutory reporting process. Two disease outbreaks-a smallpox outbreak in Schaffhausen and a typhoid outbreak in the canton of Lucerne-serve as case studies. It is shown that reports are not only objective representations of diseases, but also symbolize the medico-social interactions that produce them, timed by administrative tools like reporting forms and the act of reporting. This destabilises historical statistics and illustrates the complexity of the historical source material, as these interactions and their impact on reporting must be considered. These findings are further supported by examining the Swiss reporting system during the Spanish flu of 1918 and its failure to record influenza cases.