Newspaper advertising spaces were full of them. Zarri Toothpaste ensured "disinfectant properties" and it seemed to be no less the Pim cologne which "refreshes and kills microorganisms". Even the "fresh beer or real French cognac" of the Premiata Gambrinus company promised miracles, recalling that "it is now established that alcoholic beverages, if consumed to a limited extent, are among the best preventive remedies".
That was a world that emerged from the most tragic of wars and which, between the spring of 1918 and the summer of 1919, had to face three waves of a flu ("grippe" was the term used) called "Spanish". An illness that announced itself with muscle aches, exhaustion, chills, whooping cough, and which in the most serious cases - degenerated into pneumonia and hemorrhagic fever - led to death in a few days. In Europe the victims were three million, 700 thousand in Italy, 13 thousand in Sardinia.
Prophylaxis required the isolation of the sick, the ventilation of the premises, the use of a mask; but there were no specific cures, only therapies attempted with state quinine, bloodletting, serotherapy (ie the administration of plasma with antibodies to a healed person). Ancient and new remedies walked hand in hand, there were those who recommended snuff, some boiled vinegar compresses, some sugar (then a food subjected to rationing) in hot milk. The latter had to be a curative solution particularly used in the towns of Sardinia, to look at the number of correspondences from the countries with the title "The lack of sugar". On December 4, 1918, for example, the Unione Sarda publishes the correspondence from Sorgono with the appeal «to the illustrious Prefect of Cagliari (until 1927 the island was divided into only two provinces: Cagliari and Sassari, ed. ), so that it wants to intervene so that this country too has what is unjustly denied us ». The fact was that "almost all the towns in the province of Cagliari have had sugar," but not Sorgono. "The need - wrote the correspondent - is even more felt in these days that the epidemic is already claiming its victims and entire families are lying in bed".
A century has passed, science and medicine have made enormous strides, but today as then there are those who participate in the race for miraculous remedies for any evil, there are those who cultivate a reckless faith in the magical and saving power of potions and supplements.
