title: The 1918 influenza pandemic in New York City: age-specific timing, mortality, and transmission dynamics.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The 1918 influenza pandemic caused disproportionately high mortality among certain age groups. The mechanisms underlying these differences are not fully understood.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To explore the dynamics of the 1918 pandemic and to identify potential age-specific transmission patterns.
  
  
  METHODS
  We examined 1915-1923 daily mortality data in New York City (NYC) and estimated the outbreak duration and initial effective reproductive number (Re ) for each 1-year age cohort.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Four pandemic waves occurred from February 1918 to April 1920. The fractional mortality increase (i.e. ratio of excess mortality to baseline mortality) was highest among teenagers during the first wave. This peak shifted to 25- to 29-year-olds in subsequent waves. The distribution of age-specific mortality during the last three waves was strongly correlated (r = 0·94 and 0·86). With each wave, the pandemic appeared to spread with a comparable early growth rate but then attenuate with varying rates. For the entire population, Re estimates made assuming 2-day serial interval were 1·74 (1·27), 1·74 (1·43), 1·66 (1·25), and 1·86 (1·37), respectively, during the first week (first 3 weeks) of each wave. Using age-specific mortality, the average Re estimates over the first week of each wave were 1·62 (95% CI: 1·55-1·68), 1·68 (1·65-1·72), 1·67 (1·61-1·73), and 1·69 (1·63-1·74), respectively; Re was not significantly different either among age cohorts or between waves.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The pandemic generally caused higher mortality among young adults and might have spread mainly among school-aged children during the first wave. We propose mechanisms to explain the timing and transmission dynamics of the four NYC pandemic waves.
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA.
authors.forename: Wan
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Elisaveta
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Petkova
authors.forename: Jeffrey
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Shaman
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D049673:History, 20th Century; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007251:Influenza, Human / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000266:history / Q000401:mortality / Q000635:transmission*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009519:New York City / Q000453:epidemiology; D058873:Pandemics; D016019:Survival Analysis; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Age-specific mortality; cross-immunity; effective reproductive number; influenza pandemic; transmission dynamics