[Editor: This article about the Spanish Flu was published in The Age (Melbourne, Vic.), 17 August 1918.]
Influenza epidemic
Outbreak at Broadmeadows camp.
Two hundred soldiers in hospital.
A particularly severe type of influenza, believed to be a form of Spanish influenza, has broken out at the A.I.F. training camp at Broadmeadows. The epidemic first started about a week ago, and already over 150 recruits have been affected. The sickness has also made its appearance at the military camp at Laverton, although in a lesser degree. It is estimated that at the two camps the cases so far reported number at least 200. Patients have been arriving at the base hospital, St. Kilda-road, at the rate of 30 and 40 a day. Some of them are very ill indeed. The sickness starts like an ordinary cold, and is followed by feverishness and severe pains in the head. In two or three cases the illness has developed into pneumonia, but so far there have been no deaths. A somewhat similar epidemic occurred last year, but in a much milder form.
It may be necessary, if the epidemic continues, to close Broadmeadows camp for a time. With the object of combating the outbreak the Y.M.C.A. huts, the Lady Stanley concert hall, and the Methodist and Salvation Army huts at the camp have been closed, and the soldiers are being given leave daily from 4 p.m. to midnight, and during their absence from camp the sleeping huts of the men are being thoroughly fumigated each night.
In some quarters there has been a disposition to unduly minimise the extent of the epidemic at Broadmeadows.
Source:
The Age (Melbourne, Vic.), 17 August 1918, p. 12
Editor’s notes:
A.I.F. = Australian Imperial Force; the First Australian Imperial Force was created in 1914 to fight in World War One, the Second Australian Imperial Force was created in 1939 to fight in World War Two
Y.M.C.A. = Young Men’s Christian Association
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