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Re: CH and flu
Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2018 8:11 am
by sejintenej
JustRob wrote: ↑Mon Aug 27, 2018 6:48 pm
michael scuffil wrote: ↑Wed Jan 24, 2018 10:39 am
There was a severe outbreak in1957 - no vaccines then. I did not catch it and remember helping in the infirmary. Several houses were used for emergency beds. Can anyone shed any more information about this? My memory is poor.
Er yes, because I apparently started it. Anyway, at the time that's what Dr. Scott told me. He also told me not to mention it to anyone for fear of being found hanging from a tree in The Avenue.
Something to dine out on - how I put 600 boys to bed!
Flu wasn't the only problem in those days. There were measles, mumps and other epidemics because when you get so many people crushed almost cheek by jowl contagion is almost guaranteed
I missed the mumps epedemic at school - two days after the end of term I travelled to Belfast by overnight steamer and woke up on board with sore throat etc. My aunt, who had two sons herself, was not pleased. Of course it went to the neighbours .....
Re: CH and flu
Posted: Sun Sep 16, 2018 9:17 pm
by Foureyes
I left C.H. in December 1956, but got caught up in the 1957 flu epidemic in (I think) February. I was undergoing Army basic recruit training and about half my platoon (about 30 men) went down with the flu, were very sick, and sent to local hospitals. Unfortunately, I was one of those who did not get it, nor did any of the instructors, who could thus expend all of their energies (which were considerable) on the fifteen of us who remained. There really is no justice.
One of my enduring memories is that we survivors developed a warped idea that we could catch the flu by jumping into as hot a bath as we could bear and then running, stark naked, outside into the snow. Why we thought that could give us flu I have no idea, but, as they say, it seemed like a good idea at the time.
David
Re: CH and flu
Posted: Mon Sep 17, 2018 5:10 pm
by michael scuffil
Why we thought that could give us flu I have no idea
I suppose it could have stressed the immune system (that's probably what you intuitively thought). But probably it merely stimulated it.
Re: CH and flu
Posted: Wed Jan 30, 2019 12:48 am
by dondun
sejintenej wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2018 9:10 am
michael scuffil wrote: ↑Wed Jan 24, 2018 10:39 am
There was a severe outbreak in1957 - no vaccines then. I did not catch it and remember helping in the infirmary. Several houses were used for emergency beds. Can anyone shed any more information about this? My memory is poor.
But pictures taken of dinner parades at the time show about 10 people per house marching in, so perhaps even more dormitories were taken over.
Somewhere there is a photo of Col A going in to lunch with five on parade - and one of those was borrowed, I think. I must have been in bed myself. From dim memory I didn't feel particularly ill - not like later attacks.
Earlier there had been an epidemic of mumps, I think in the easter term. I got through that but, going by ship to Belfast, less than a week into the holidays I woke up with the mumps. We didn't tell the others sharing the cabin and my aunt (who had two boys herself) was very displeased.
Yes,like you I did not catch it and remember being asked to help in the Infirmary by Dr Scott. I remember not attending lessons while the outbreak was at its height, but the rest is, I am sorry to say, a blur