The Sumo Flu

The leading theory on the origin of the 1918 influenza pandemic points at rural America. In the spring of 1918, a doctor in Haskell County, Kansas, filed a report with federal authorities about an unusually virulent flu strain.[1] This was the first official medical report of the virus that became known later, incorrectly, as the Spanish Flu. Haskell County was a logical place for the virus to make the jump from animals to humans because it was known for its pig farms and was a popular stopover point for migrating birds. Pigs and birds are frequent suspects for viral transmission to humans. It makes sense.

Wrestlers then and now live in very close quarters.

              But there were reports of virulent flu viruses coming from Asia and Europe at about the same time as well. With 20-20 hindsight, everything looks ominous and important.

              In Japan, the first indication of a nasty new flu strain came in April, when three sumo wrestlers representing the Oguruma Stable (尾車部屋) suddenly became ill and died while in Taiwan for an exhibition tournament. At the May Tournament (５月場所) a few weeks later, so many wrestlers were out with the flu that the competition schedule had to be redrawn.[2]  The “Sumo Flu” (相撲風邪), as newspaper reports dubbed it, disappeared as quickly as it appeared. By summer it had been mostly forgotten. It wasn’t until autumn that the global flu pandemic swept through Japan’s broader population, taking more than 388,000 souls by 1921. It was especially virulent among young people. Across the world, more than 50 million people died.

              The Sumo Flu may have been a different strain than the Haskell County one; it may have been a cousin, and an indicator of dark times to come. As a sumo fan, it has been disheartening over the past two years to see tournaments restricted, closed to spectators, or cancelled. I hope we don’t have to see that again.

We are not finished with COVID-19, though, and hundred-year-old news reports feel disquietingly relevant and real. Stay healthy, friends.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC340389/

[2] http://www.asahi.com/information/db/130/20090930_1.html