If before June, the governments of European countries were confident, since August began, they can be described as ants on a hot pan, and even using "panic-stricken" to describe them would not be an exaggeration.
The high number of deaths kept the priests of the Church extremely busy. European funerals almost all require priests to preside, perform baptism for the deceased, and wash away their sins.
The problem, however, was that the number of deaths in each country soared linearly, while the number of priests remained basically unchanged. Even many priests were within the scope of the influenza infection, after all, they needed to come into contact with corpses, naturally putting them at high risk.
Fortunately, Europe does not have the tradition of flying white sails; otherwise, it would be a sea of white at this moment.
