Yeah, I am amazed how it's all come out of the woodwork, but there were also a lot of quirky solutions even back in 1918. Proof that nothing ever changes, even though we should technically know a lot better since then! If you're interested, the book I'm referring to is The Great Influenza by John M. Barry. I found it highly informative and I've learned about early medicine from it. It was a very enlightening read.
As for the wait times, here in my Province, a majority of people don't have family doctors and rely more on walk-in-clinics for their needs, and it's even more true further north like where I live. I've waited even longer at one of those clinics once before, for 4-8 hours before I was seen.
It's a bit of a repeat from 1918, but for different reasons. Very early on, because of the war, there was a blanket on anything related to the pandemic. And records weren't kept very well like they are now. Nowadays, we do have the capability, to keep better records, and better technology and knowledge to help fight our epidemics. Now it's as if there's an unwillingness to embrace the facts, leading to many of the same mistakes that were made back then. We could do so much better if we were all to stick together (although not so close together, thank you) and be on the same page. It's really unfortunate that's become politicized in some parts of the world, because it really shouldn't be. There's a reason it's a world-wide pandemic, because it's affecting nearly everybody either directly or indirectly. Covid doesn't care for political affiliations.