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Text Chapter 638: Plague (1)

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    The year 1918 arrived in the expectation of Scrooge and many people like Scrooge. The United States declared war on Germany a few months ago, but just as the German generals estimated, the U.S. Army¡¯s  Scaling takes time.  So until the beginning of 1918, the American Army, which the British and French were eager to see through, was still being formed.  But there was one thing that the German generals failed to explain in detail to their emperor, that is, it would not take that long for the U.S. Navy to join the war.  Compared with the U.S. Army, which immediately puts weapons and weapons into storage as soon as a war is over, and puts their horses into Nanshan, the U.S. Navy has always remained armed to the teeth.  Therefore, the U.S. Navy can enter the war almost immediately from the time it declares war.  Although the U.S. Navy does not have much experience in anti-submarine warfare, as the third largest navy in the world, their anti-submarine capabilities are still quite good.  The Americans had hundreds of destroyers and soon obtained anti-submarine airships from Republic Airways based on the proposal of some naval officers.  Before the war started, when the German Zeppelin first started researching his hard-shell airship, he received investment from McDonough Venture Capital. During this cooperation, McDonough also obtained a lot of hard-shell airships.  technology.  By this time, these technologies found application in Republic's anti-submarine airship program.  Republic's anti-submarine airship is almost a copycat version of the Zeppelin. It is smaller than the Zeppelin and of course cheaper.  The maximum speed is comparable to that of a Zeppelin, about 80-90 kilometers per hour.  The airships themselves did not carry much weaponry; their main weapons were their telescopes and radio stations.  In that era, submarines were floating on the water most of the time. In this way, the airships that were condescending and painted themselves gray-blue had every chance of spotting those floating submarines, and then they would track them.  Submarines, and continuously report the position of those submarines to the regional anti-submarine team responsible for anti-submarine through radio.  The so-called regional anti-submarine squadron generally consists of three to five destroyers. They are not assigned to the merchant fleet to perform escort missions, but are solely responsible for anti-submarine attacks in an important sea area.  Unlike the escorting destroyers, those destroyers cannot be entangled with submarines for a long time. They must sail with the merchant fleet.  The destroyers in the regional anti-submarine team are different. They have nothing to protect and can keep entangled with the submarine until they sink the submarine.  Once a submarine is discovered by an airship on the sea, it will not be long before it will be attacked by a summoned regional anti-submarine team. Therefore, once it is discovered by an anti-submarine airship, they must dive, thus acting as sentinels among the wolves.  The submarines often have to hide underwater and are unable to send back the news of the transport fleet in time, which naturally makes the organization of the wolf pack's night attack more difficult.  So, unfortunately, the Germans still failed to cut off the Atlantic route.  Of course, both regional anti-submarine teams and anti-submarine airships mean more orders, but these orders are only a small number compared with the orders the Army currently provides to McDonald.  The number of the Army will expand from hundreds of thousands today to approximately 4 million (this chapter is not finished yet, please turn the page). Providing these people with weapons, various equipment, and logistical services will drive the entire American business crazy.  , now in a company owned by McDonald's or any other company, you will see that the machines are not shut down 24 hours a day, and the workers are busy in three shifts.  Even senior executives like Gray Stone and Donald are too busy to keep their feet on the ground.  As for Scrooge, he has been very busy recently. In the past few years, McDonald's Pharmaceuticals has established several modern herbal medicine planting bases in the Philippines and China. Now it is time to harvest many medicinal materials.  These medicinal materials were loaded on ships and shipped back to the United States, ready to be put to great use.  In March 1918, the plague that Scrooge had been waiting for finally arrived.  The second deadliest plague in human history began to appear in Europe.  This is the most famous Spanish flu in history.  During this influenza, approximately 20 to 40 million people died worldwide, a death toll that far exceeded that of World War I.  And this number is still a relatively conservative number, because countries are busy with wars and have not done a good job in statistics.  So the number of unregistered deaths can be very high, especially in India.  According to some accounts, about 70 million people may have died in the entire world.  In North America, this disease caused the death of more than one million people. In the month of October 1918 alone, 200,000 people died in the United States due to the Spanish Flu.  Because of this plague, the average life expectancy in the United States dropped by 12 years in 1918 from the previous year.  Scrooge still remembers how, in his previous life, a thing called a gun was used in the Red ArmyChina creates unlimited business opportunities.  This epidemic has caused only more than 900 deaths worldwide, and has led to a boom in sales of various drugs, including antiviral drugs, the folk remedy Isatis root, which is said to be useful, and various masks.  Among a population of more than one billion, a disease that causes less than 1,000 deaths can make all isatis root sold out in the entire Red Rabbit Kingdom, all masks in medical stores, and even dust masks in labor insurance stores.  Everything is sold out.  And now, how much money can Scrooge earn from a plague like this that can kill more than one million people in the United States and tens of millions of people in the entire world?  Scrooge felt excited just by thinking about it.  Over the years, Scrooge had put a lot of thought into this common cold.  The University of Cleveland School of Medicine conducted quite detailed research on influenza under his direct intervention.  They have successively published many related papers in journals such as The Lancet and Science. Although they have not yet fully proposed that China's Yunnan and Guizhou and even part of the Southeast Peninsula are the origin of most influenza.  has been proven, but at least it has become the most mainstream view on the origin of influenza.  Of course, their view that some treatment methods in traditional Chinese medicine may have a certain reference effect on the treatment of influenza has not received much recognition. This is because of the natural affinity of white people for Asian barbarians.  Contempt, on the other hand, is also because people at the University of Cleveland School of Medicine have always only paid lip service to this concept, but have never come up with any practical information.  In fact, if it weren¡¯t for the purpose of explaining Macdonald in the future (this chapter is not finished, please turn the page) how medicine can suddenly come up with life-saving medicines, Scrooge would not have leaked so many things in academic journals.  In history, there have been three epidemics of the 1918 Spanish Flu. The earliest one was in Europe in March and April. The scope of the epidemic was not too large, and the number of infected people and deaths was relatively limited.  By that time, the World War had been going on for several years, and Europeans' sensitivity to death had dropped significantly.  Therefore, this epidemic did not bring much panic.  However, Scrooge paid special attention to this epidemic. Under his direct concern, a charity medical team from Salvation Hospital was sent to Europe to treat related patients and test the MacDonald Medical Company.  The effect of "antiviral oral liquid".  ¡­ ¡°Mr. MacDonald, there is a new telegram.¡± The secretary handed a telegram to Scrooge. Scrooge lowered his head and read it, and then he couldn¡¯t help laughing.  "Very good, notify China immediately and buy all the raw materials for A drugs available on the market." Scrooge ordered.  "Okay, sir. I'll do it right away." The secretary replied.  The so-called raw material a refers to the main medicinal material isatis root used in antiviral oral liquid.  The telegram just now was sent back from Europe, which said that McDonald's antiviral oral solution has a very good therapeutic effect on this new type of influenza that is difficult to deal with.  Scrooge knew that historically, the impact of this epidemic in March and April was very limited, but when the second epidemic came in the autumn of that year, it was the most deadly one.  Now he has plenty of time to prepare for the fall pandemic.  Buying in all the raw materials is of course one of the preparations, but this is only the simplest preparation. The more important preparation is public opinion.  Otherwise, the current hoarding behavior will be enough to make his name as dirty as the mother river of a certain South Asian country in later generations.  "First of all, give a warning in the newspapers," Scrooge thought, "and give relevant warnings in the New York Times and the Times of England. Such warnings will be of no use anyway." Indeed, newspapers  Generally speaking, this kind of warning will not have any big effect.  First of all, the reliability of such warnings is very uncertain. Even for an expert on epidemics, in that era, his predictions about the prevalence of any future epidemic were quite unreliable.  Secondly, taking countermeasures requires a lot of money. Nowadays, European countries are busy with wars, and the United States is also busy preparing to participate in the war. It is so far away from Europe, so it naturally has no sense of urgency for the cold that appears in Europe.  At this time, no one has the financial resources to spend so much money on a cold that may or may not happen, or is even more likely to not happen.  Once such a warning is issued, Scrooge can say: "Look, I have reminded everyone to prepare, but no one responded. So I can only do the preparations for everyone myself. This  How can you call it hoarding? " "That's it, let Graystone arrange it, we'll be in the newspaper.Just issue a warning first.  " Scrooge thought. (End of chapter)
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