- Experts say it is 'unlikely' the site still has active pathogens
- Bones of impoverished victims found under highway embankment
- Believed impromptu burial site once been the site of a poorhouse
- Experts say it could contain a mass grave for victims
The state highway department, known as PennDOT, received reports of bones in what appeared to be an impromptu burial site beneath a broad meadow that had once been the site of a poorhouse, said Bob Rescorla, a PennDOT inspector at the site.
Researchers are now looking for more bones believed to be from impoverished victims of the worldwide Spanish flu pandemic in 1918.
The state highway department, known as PennDOT, received reports of bones in what appeared to be an impromptu burial site beneath a broad meadow that had once been the site of a poorhouse, said Bob Rescorla, a PennDOT inspector at the site.
'There were rumors it was a mass grave here,' Rescorla said of the burial ground along State Highway 61 in Schuylkill Haven, about 100 miles northwest of Philadelphia. Historians say the Spanish flu pandemic touched all parts of the world and claimed tens of millions of lives. The flu could kill quickly, sometimes in less than a day.
In Schuylkill County, the Pottsville Republican-Herald newspaper reported that some 17,000 residents were sickened and several thousand died during the pandemic, leaving as many as 3,000 children orphaned.
Comment: For more information on the effects of long-term droughts on other ancient civilizations, see: