So many experts argue that covid-19 is going to change a lot of things and how international relations will fundementally change. But most people just remembered that there was a spanish flu in 1918 that killed around 50m people. But the topic is always brushed away and many aspects remained the same. International Relations did not change significantly and historically it did not have a huge impact. It's as if people just continued their ways after the Spanish flu as if nothing happened. Will we also return to the status quo once we find a vaccine? Was spanish flu really that unsignificant as it is hardly ever studied?
I would suspect two reasons: Contemporary Global Events and a Mysterious Disappearance
The time that the Spanish Flu took place in was the end and the immediate aftermath of WWI, the up to that point deadliest conflict in human history, meaning the population had being.... partially desensitized to a massive amount of death and human suffering, meaning there was not as much of a societal impact as some other plagues and mass waves of sickness. And secondly, the Flu only lasted for about 2 or 3 years, and then suddenly vanished from the face of the earth, without a single trace. It’s unknowable, did not arouse any significant history attention due to its circumstances, and it vanished nearly as quickly as it came. It didn’t have a legacy because it was a historical anomaly surrounded by other more overbearing historical events, and thus did not enrapture the public consciousness, thus diluting its role in history to its modern lack of influence