[Jim Verdolini]

"Other than some isolated cases the death rates of the 1918 flu never came close to what Smallpox did to the native Americans or the Plague did to Europe in the middle ages."

Both disasters took place in limited areas over a far longer period and killed vastly fewer people.

I said it was the worst disaster in human history. I did not say european history or native american history.

You are not grasping the difference. In 1918, between september and march 1919, the flu killed over 40 million people. Where it hit, normal life stoped. Read the history of the event.

try these links

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/influenza/

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/influenza/sfeature/boston.html

http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews/magazine/archive/Mag_Fall04/prologues/page2.html

http://www.upenn.edu/gazette/1198/lynch.html

[TexasRepublic]

Both disasters took place in limited areas over a far longer period and killed vastly fewer people.

In absolute numbers, I don't know, but I've read that a third of Europe's population died from the plague, even if it was over an extended period. That is not insignificant and the European economy took over a century to recover. I agree with your previous comments on the effects a pandemic could have. I highly recommend you read "Through A Distant Mirror" by Barbara W. Tuchman for a detailed description of the plague's disruption of life in Europe. I did read the entire article, unlike some on this thread, and saw at least one documented case of human to human transmission, so it appears that an isolated mutation has happened and thus can likely happen again.

[Swiss]

The Black Death killed much more percent of the population and historians have agreed it changed history.

According the this link 25 million out of a population in Europe of 75 million died. That is Europe alone, the plague also struck the Middle east and China so chances are it exceeded the 40 million of the 1918 flu out of a much smaller population.

http://www.themiddleages.net/plague.html

The 1918 flu was pretty much forgotten within a few years and lasted only about a year.

Parts of Europe did not recover their pre-plague population until the 17th century. How long did it take the World to make up the losses of 1918?