Influenza is “rampant” on Pohnpei.

What happened

Missionary letters from Pohnpei record an outbreak of one disease or another every few years after the 1854 smallpox epidemic; influenza was “rampant” in 1856, 1871, 1874 and 1879. Hezel estimates these epidemics left Pohnpei with about 5,000 people by 1900, half its 1840 population.