Spanish flu

American  

[span-ish floo] / ˈspæn ɪʃ ˈflu /

Also Spanish influenza

noun

Pathology.

1. the pandemic strain of type A influenza that spread throughout the world during 1918–20: it is also referred to as the 1918 flu pandemic or 1918 influenza pandemic .

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Etymology

Origin of Spanish flu

First recorded in 1918; so called because wartime censorship in the major belligerent powers, particularly the U.S., Great Britain, Germany, and France, minimized early reports of illness and mortality among themselves but freely reported the effects of the pandemic in neutral Spain, leaving the impression that Spain was very hard hit by this flu

Compare meaning

How does spanish-flu compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• Spanish flu vs. Black Death
• Spanish flu vs. Black Plague

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Spanish flu

But the pandemic of Spanish flu after the First World War killed around 50 million people worldwide.

From BBC ● Apr. 21, 2026

Muldoon died of a heart attack in 1929 in Tacoma at age 41, possibly weakened by his Spanish flu bout from 1919.

From Seattle Times ● Mar. 2, 2024

Everyone knows by now that a virus can bring a nation to its knees — the tiny terrorists of smallpox, Spanish flu and COVID-19 have disrupted America’s story in lethal and tragic ways.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 8, 2024

When the Spanish flu pandemic arrived in 1918, officials expanded the approach, said E. Thomas Ewing, a historian at Virginia Tech.

From New York Times ● Jun. 17, 2023

The Spanish flu of 1918 had raged through the continent, killing nearly 20 million men and women worldwide and ranking among the deadliest natural disasters in history.

From "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee