Posted on 10/02/2009 10:44:59 AM PDT by decimon
The devastation of the 1918-1919 influenza pandemic is well known, but a new article suggests a surprising factor in the high death toll: the misuse of aspirin. Appearing in the November 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases and available online now, the article sounds a cautionary note as present day concerns about the novel H1N1 virus run high.
High aspirin dosing levels used to treat patients during the 1918-1919 pandemic are now known to cause, in some cases, toxicity and a dangerous build up of fluid in the lungs, which may have contributed to the incidence and severity of symptoms, bacterial infections, and mortality. Additionally, autopsy reports from 1918 are consistent with what we know today about the dangers of aspirin toxicity, as well as the expected viral causes of death.
(Excerpt) Read more at hivma.org ...
Bayer pattern ping.
Interesting ping.
Could be plausible as asprin was touted as an “Everything Medicine” back then and we didn’t have any really good cold/flu drugs in 1918.
From the link: “...physicians of the day were unaware that the regimens (8.0–31.2 g per day) produce levels associated with hyperventilation and pulmonary edema in 33% and 3% of recipients...”
The US was largely rural during this time. There weren’t a lot of doctors or hospitals or aspirin, period. I doubt aspirin had much to do with mortality.
That's a LOT of aspirin--between 25 and 80 325 mg tabs, or 16 to 65 Extra Strength (500 mg) tabs.
| The last thing a person with hemorrhagic bleeding - such as was present with the 1918 "Spanish Flu" - should do is take a drug that acts as a blood thinner. Stay away from aspirin if H1N1 mutates into something like H5N1.
Symptoms in 1918 were so unusual that initially influenza was misdiagnosed as dengue, as cholera, as typhoid. Wrote one observer, “One of the most striking of the complications was hemorrhage from mucous membranes, especially from the nose, stomach, and intestine. Bleeding from the ears and petechial hemorrhages in the skin also occurred.” A German investigator recorded “hemorrhages occurring in different parts of the interior of the eye” with great frequency. An American pathologist noted: “Fifty cases of soft subconjunctival hemorrhage were counted. Twelve had true hemotosis, bright red blood with no admixture of mucus. Three cases had hemorrhage”. The New York City Health Department's chief pathologist said “Cases with pain look and act like cases of dengue...hemorrhage from nose or bronchi... paresis or paralysis of either cerebral or spinal origin... impairment of motion may be severe or mild, permanent or temporary... physical and mental depression. Intense and protracted prostration led to hysteria, melancholia, and insanity with suicidal intent.” |
True, but I don't know what was the amount in the 'tabs' of that day.
Getting to today, I'm wondering if lesser doses could exacerbate the buildup of lung fluids. I hope this doesn't disappear down the memory hole as I'd like to see some followup.
Thanks. That is scary but informative.
My father, who started medical practice in 1935, always said that until antibiotics came out in the early 1950s about the only effective drug available was aspirin.
IIRC, that was because we used the war as an excuse to screw the Germans out of the aspirin patent and the U.S. division of Bayer. But the German Bayer bought it back a decade or so ago.
VERY interesting. Thank you. I only skimmed the excerpt since I am at work, but I will check it out tonight. Thank you!
| Ibuprofen was launched as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis in the United Kingdom in 1969, and in the United States in 1974. NOTE: Ibuprofen causes minor blood thinning - taken with Aspirin, it can lead to easy bruising. Naproxen was originally marketed as the prescription drug Naprosyn in 1976, and naproxen sodium was first marketed under the trade name Anaprox in 1980. NOTE: Naproxen also acts as a blood thinner. Acetaminophen (paracetamol) was first administered in 1886 as Antifebrin in Germany, but was shunned by most doctors for more than 50 years because of misunderstood medical complications. Acetaminophen was first marketed in the US in 1953 as safe for children and people with ulcers; in 1955 as Tylenol. NOTE: Acetaminophen does NOT act as a blood thinner. Willow Bark was first noted by Hippocrates (460-377 BC) as a pain relief and fever treatment. Its salicylic acid was identified and refined first in 1828. In 1899, it was sold worldwide by Bayer as Aspirin. Today, its routinely taken to reduce the risk of heart attack and strokes because of its anti-clotting ability.
"Aspirin's popularity grew over the first half of the twentieth century, spurred by its effectiveness in the wake of the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 ... ... if only they knew that it probably led to more internal bleeding due to its blood thinning effects and minor stomach bleeding ...
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Thanks. More good info.
bump & a micro ping
The source links the abstract.
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Back during the end of WWI in 1918-1819, as a soldier, they would have had 2 major choices for pain: Aspirin or morphine. Seeing how morphine had just been declared a controlled substance in 1914, and was somewhat shunned by the Army from the "soldier's disease" it caused troops in the Civil War, Aspirin was seen as a cheap, addictive-less alternative. I suspect there were few warnings on dosage with Aspirin in those days. But I can definitely see it complicating medical issues if a person is hemorrhaging from the Spanish Flu - especially if they took 1000 mg or more because they were in so much pain. It would have made them just bleed out more. I just can't help but think of rows and rows of soldiers in pain from the Spanish Flu, and that unsuspecting doctors probably just left bottles by their cot-side
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They Bayer not be right about this. Thanks decimon. |
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Keep up with other H1N1 update stories on this thread: H1N1 flu victim collapsed on way to hospital [Latest H1N1 updates downthread] thanks to DvdMom and others.
Thanks for the ping!
Does it work that way with everyday type flu?
Does it work that way with everyday type flu?
I don't know. One reason for posting this stuff is the feedback in the comments from people with better knowledge.
Maybe a freeper doctor will post a reply...
Anything is possible, it seems.
aspirin use and pulmonary edema:
http://www.japi.org/april2007/Corr2.pdf
Excellent. Thanks.
I don’t know that I’ve ever reacted to salicylates but how would I know? Lung congestion feels like lung congestion and that’s expected with a cold, flu, whatever.
It’s not just a question of hemorrhaging being worsened by blood-thinning aspirin.
The other issue with aspirin is that it lowers fever. In the early stages of viral infection the virus replicates extremely rapidly (in geometric fashion). The main way the body fights against the replication of the virus initially is by increasing body temperature, so that viral replication is shut down, and so that Natural Killer cells and other immune system components travel faster in the bloodstream to attack the virus.
Taking something for the fever during the early stages of a viral infection only gives the virus more chance to get a stronger foothold, and when the body has manufactured enough antibodies to kill the virus it could already be overwhelmed.
Plus, the more of the virus that is killed by antibodies, the more waste products tend to build up in mucus membranes, including in the lungs. This is what causes the “Cytokine Storm” that makes people susceptible to secondary lung infections. Secondary infections are what kills people with flu infections, not the original virus.
Secondary infections are what kills people with flu infections, not the original virus.
I believe that's true of many virus infections. The virus might not be debilitating-to-deadly but it opens the door to secondary bacterial infection that may well be deadly.
“The virus might not be debilitating-to-deadly but it opens the door to secondary bacterial infection that may well be deadly.”
Yeah, and when you consider that flu doesn’t usually include a hemorrhagic component then that seems to add even more credence to the aspirin story.
ping
I’ve seen the thread already. Thank you anyway.
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