Lung Samples From 1918 Show a Pandemic Virus Mutating
The Atlantic Three 103-year-old-lung samples hinted at how the flu mutated to become more deadly. 11:49 AM ET A converted warehouse that was used to isolate 1918 flu patientsUniversal History Archive / Universal Images Group via Getty The three teenagers—two boys and a girl—could not have known what clues their lungs would one day yield. All they could have known, or felt, before they died in Germany in 1918 was their flu-ravaged lungs failing them, each breath getting harder and harder. Tens of millions of people like them died in the flu pandemic of 1918; they happened to be three whose...