Is coronavirus following 1918 Spanish flu trend in Hyderabad?

HYDERABAD: Covid-19 seems to be treading the path of an earlier pandemic, Spanish flu of 1918, in the city, if the Census of Hyderabad 1921 report is any indication.
Census Hyderabad 1921 report reveals that though the pandemic influenza had visited the city earlier in 1918, it was sporadic. This is just like the initial Covid-19 trend when Hyderabad reported only a handful of cases.Then, the influenza had spread very gradually by September and reached its peak by October-end in 1918. After claiming several lives in a short span, the pandemic influenza subsided and simply faded out by November-end. The 1918 flu had “slow”, “very gradually increase” and “alarming height” phases in Hyderabad.
Covid-19 is now in the “very gradually increase” phase if the high number of positive cases reported in the last fortnight is any indication. Once it reaches the “alarming height” phase, the cases may increase further and thereafter the viral infection might lose its sting.

“Though the trend of Spanish flu and Covid-19 appears similar as far as the number of cases are concerned, the mortality rate was very high in case of flu. In case of 1918 flu, Hyderabadis had achieved what epidemiologists call herd immunity by October-end that year after almost one in two people suffered,” INTACH city convener P Anuradha Reddy said.
The Census 1921 data reveals that the daily death-rate due to influenza rose to 46.5 per thousand by the end of September 1918 in Hyderabad.
The Census data also revealed that during the decade 1911-1921, plague and cholera also “carried off, on the whole, 194,325 and 42,246 persons respectively”.