The Significance of Lifestyle Habits on the Acquisition of the Spanish Flu - Essay Sample

Introduction

The Spanish Flu, first reported in the United States military base in Kansas in March 1918, remains one of the most severe pandemics in recent human history. Spanish Flu is caused by an H1N1 influenza A virus and lasted over a year during the 1918 pandemic. Despite the name, the virus’s source remains unknown, although powerful nations such as France, China, and Britain often associate with the potential birthplace of the virus. According to the WHO, the disease risk factors remain similar to those of other influenza subtypes A infections that occur across seasons. Therefore, this paper proposes to investigate the significance of lifestyle habits on acquiring the Spanish Flu.

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Research Overview

Pandemics remain part of the current highly advanced world with bacterial and viral evolution competing to match humans. Human activities have also sparked the initiation of evolutionary processes through rigorous scientific experiments and research. Individuals, therefore, should embrace and acknowledge the significance of preparation for future pandemics and endemics. In the 2009 H1N1 outbreak, one-week school closure in Taiwan translated to an inability to work for approximately 27% of families, while 18% lost their income sources (Nicola et al., 2020, p. 187).

Lifestyle habits contribute to many chronic diseases, mostly related to an increased sedentary life with low or no mobility. According to the United Nations (UN), an individual’s lifestyle may sometimes contribute to disease susceptibility, prevalence, and effect on a person. The UN also associates lifestyle diseases and infections to over-exposure to poor recreational habits such as smoking, unhealthy diets, and lack of physical activity (Al-Maskari, 2010).

Background Information

The Spanish flu pandemic resulting from the H1N1 subtype was first reported in 1918 when an avian origin’s influenza virus affected human beings. The influenza virus in 1918 spread over the world and infected over 500 million people while killing over 50 million individuals during the pandemic. Unlike the current Coronavirus pandemic, the Spanish Flu affected and killed healthy individuals prone to high-risk factors. However, the lack of a vaccine left individuals to divulge to non-pharmaceutical interventions such as quarantine, isolation, limiting gatherings, use of hygiene, and disinfectants as Covid-19 (Haleem et al., 2020, p. 78). Lack of a cure for the disease means medics and patients have resolved to manage symptoms creating a high burden for the medical system while overloading healthcare professionals.

Research Importance

This research seeks to identify the correlation between lifestyle choices (recreation, physical activities, and sleep) to the susceptibility of the Spanish Flu. Currently, few researchers have focused on the significance of lifestyle habits on H1N1 infections, as Choi et al. (2014) argue that to “their knowledge,” no such study exists (p. 423). In a bid to reduce people’s risk factors to H1N1 and future pandemics, this research seeks to explore the lessons learned from the Spanish flu pandemic.

Research Questions

• What is the correlation between a person’s physical activities and Spanish flu susceptibility?
• What is the relationship between sleep and the Spanish Flu?
• Does smoking increase a person’s susceptibility to the Spanish Flu?
• Does a high rate of physical activities cushion a person against severe Spanish flu infections?
• Do all patients suffer from Spanish flu report sleep disturbances and lack of quality sleep?

Research Methods

This research will adopt secondary data due to the extensive challenges associated with obtaining data from primary sources. Besides, the paper aims to isolate the significance of lifestyle habits on the Spanish flue during the previous pandemics, making it difficult to conduct primary research. Identifying sources for this exploratory research will adopt an inclusion and exclusion criteria to prevent bias and provide extensive findings.

Inclusion Criteria

Researchers will conduct a Google scholar search and a library catalog search for resources on the ‘Spanish flu’ with a particular interest in lifestyle choices (sleep, physical activities, and smoking). The “Spanish flu, sleep, physical activities, and smoking” will represent critical words for the search criteria. Derivatives of the search words such as synonyms, acronyms, and combination with articles may also be used to obtain a minimum of 10 peer-reviewed sources.

Data Analysis

Data analysis will evaluate the number of patients adopted in each suitable study to examine the significance of each factor of lifestyle choices such as smoking, sleep, and physical activities. Overall, the study will draw qualitative conclusions regarding the importance and correlation of each element with the susceptibility and infection of the Spanish Flu.

Significance of the Research

The significance of lifestyle choices in developing an individual’s immunity and the susceptibility to diseases remains quite extensive. Similarly, the flu virus pandemic of 2009 may have been subject to the apparent lifestyle conditions and individual choices in a more profound perspective, as is the current pandemic case.

References

Al-Maskari, F. (2010). Lifestyle diseases: An economic burden on the health services. United Nations. https://www.un.org/en/chronicle/article/lifestyle-diseases-economic-burden-health-services

Choi, S. M., Jeong, Y., Park, J. S., Kang, H. J., Lee, Y. J., Park, S. S., Lim, H., Chung, H. S., & Lee, C. (2014). The impact of lifestyle behaviors on the acquisition of pandemic (H1N1) influenza infection: A case-control study. Yonsei Medical Journal, 55(2), 422-427. https://doi.org/10.3349/ymj.2014.55.2.422

Haleem, A., Javaid, M., & Vaishya, R. (2020). Effects of COVID-19 pandemic in daily life. Current Medicine Research and Practice, 10(2), 78-79. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmrp.2020.03.011

Ibarra-Coronado, E. G., Pantaleón-Martínez, A. M., Velazquéz-Moctezuma, J., Prospéro-García, O., Méndez-Díaz, M., Pérez-Tapia, M., Pavón, L., & Morales-Montor, J. (2015). The bidirectional relationship between sleep and immunity against infections. Journal of Immunology Research, 2015, 1-14. https://doi.org/10.1155/2015/678164

Lee, P., Hu, Y. L., Chen, P., Huang, Y., & Hsueh, P. (2020). Are children less susceptible to COVID-19? Journal of Microbiology, Immunology, and Infection, 53(3), 371-372. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmii.2020.02.011

Leung, C. (2020). Clinical features of deaths in the novel coronavirus epidemic in China. Reviews in Medical Virology, e2103. https://doi.org/10.1002/rmv.2103

Lihua, Z., She, Z. G., Cheng, X., Guo, J., Zhang, B. H., & Li, H. (2020). Association of blood glucose control and outcomes in patients with COVID-19 and pre-existing type 2 Diabetes. Cell Metabolism, 1068-1077. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2020.04.021

Nicola, M., Alsafi, Z., Sohrabi, C., Kerwan, A., Al-Jabir, A., Iosifidis, C., Agha, M., & Agha, R. (2020). The socio-economic implications of the coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19): A review. International Journal of Surgery, 78, 185-193. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijsu.2020.04.018

Sun, L., Tang, Y., & Zuo, W. (2020). Coronavirus pushes education online. Nature Materials, 19(6), 687. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-020-0678-8

Tabish, S. A. (2017). Lifestyle diseases: Consequences, characteristics, causes, and control. Journal of Cardiology & Current Research, 9(3), 2-5. https://doi.org/10.15406/jccr.2017.09.00326