THE FLU ARRIVES TO VISIT THE GRANDMA'S HOME

Arriving to the Medical Centre

The Grandma is knocked out. She's suffering the consequences of the flu and she's totally destroyed. Yesterday, she started feeling the first symtomps and she went to her local medical center.

While she was waiting for her turn, she had enough force to study a new lesson of her Elementary Language Practice manual (Grammar 23).

After visiting the doctor, The Grandma is following her instructions: stay at bed, take warm drinks and take some medicines. It's a matter of time, more or less seven days, to stay fine again and ready to continue with her normal life.

More information: Present Continuous-Future Use

Influenza, commonly known as the flu, is an infectious disease caused by an influenza virus. Symptoms can be mild to severe. The most common symptoms include: high fever, runny nose, sore throat, muscle pains, headache, coughing, sneezing, and feeling tired. These symptoms typically begin two days after exposure to the virus and most last less than a week. The cough, however, may last for more than two weeks.

In children, there may be diarrhea and vomiting, but these are not common in adults. Diarrhea and vomiting occur more commonly in gastroenteritis, which is an unrelated disease and sometimes inaccurately referred to as stomach flu or the 24-hour flu. Complications of influenza may include viral pneumonia, secondary bacterial pneumonia, sinus infections, and worsening of previous health problems such as asthma or heart failure.

Analyzing flu symptoms

Three of the four types of influenza viruses affect people, Type A, Type B, and Type C.  Type D has not been known to infect people, but is believed to have the potential to do so. Usually, the virus is spread through the air from coughs or sneezes. This is believed to occur mostly over relatively short distances. It can also be spread by touching surfaces contaminated by the virus and then touching the mouth or eyes.

A person may be infectious to others both before and during the time they are showing symptoms. The infection may be confirmed by testing the throat, sputum, or nose for the virus. A number of rapid tests are available; however, people may still have the infection even if the results are negative.  A type of polymerase chain reaction that detects the virus's RNA is more accurate.

More information: History

Frequent hand washing reduces the risk of viral spread. Wearing a surgical mask is also useful. Yearly vaccinations against influenza are recommended by the World Health Organization for those at high risk. The vaccine is usually effective against three or four types of influenza. It is usually well-tolerated. A vaccine made for one year may not be useful in the following year, since the virus evolves rapidly. Antiviral drugs such as the neuraminidase inhibitor oseltamivir, among others, have been used to treat influenza. The benefit of antiviral drugs in those who are otherwise healthy do not appear to be greater than their risks. No benefit has been found in those with other health problems.

Following the doctor's advice

Influenza spreads around the world in yearly outbreaks, resulting in about three to five million cases of severe illness and about 250,000 to 500,000 deaths. About 20% of unvaccinated children and 10% of unvaccinated adults are infected each year. In the northern and southern parts of the world, outbreaks occur mainly in the winter, while around the Equator, outbreaks may occur at any time of the year. Death occurs mostly in the young, the old, and those with other health problems. Larger outbreaks known as pandemics are less frequent.

In the 20th century, three influenza pandemics occurred: Spanish influenza in 1918, ~50 million deaths, Asian influenza in 1957, two million deaths, and Hong Kong influenza in 1968, one million deaths. The World Health Organization declared an outbreak of a new type of influenza A/H1N1 to be a pandemic in June 2009. Influenza may also affect other animals, including pigs, horses, and birds. Approximately 33% of people with influenza are asymptomatic.

Symptoms of influenza can start quite suddenly one to two days after infection. Usually the first symptoms are chills and body aches, but fever is also common early in the infection, with body temperatures ranging from 38 to 39 °C, approximately 100 to 103 °F. Many people are so ill that they are confined to bed for several days, with aches and pains throughout their bodies, which are worse in their backs and legs.

More information: Johnson & Johnson

The main symptoms of influenza are:

-Fever and chills

-Cough

-Nasal congestion

-Runny nose

-Sneezing

-Sore throat

-Hoarseness

-Earache

-Muscle pains

-Fatigue

-Headache

-Irritated, watering eyes

-Reddened eyes, skin (especially face), mouth, throat and nose

-Petechial rash

In children, gastrointestinal symptoms such as vomiting, diarrhea, and abdominal pain, may be severe in children with influenza B.

It can be difficult to distinguish between the common cold and influenza in the early stages of these infections. Influenza is a mixture of symptoms of common cold and pneumonia, body ache, headache, and fatigue. Diarrhea is not usually a symptom of influenza in adults, although it has been seen in some human cases of the H5N1 bird flu and can be a symptom in children.

Surviving the flu at home

When an infected person sneezes or coughs more than half a million virus particles can be spread to those close by. In otherwise healthy adults, influenza virus shedding, the time during which a person might be infectious to another person, increases sharply one-half to one day after infection, peaks on day 2 and persists for an average total duration of 5 days, but can persist as long as 9 days. In those who develop symptoms from experimental infection, only 67% of healthy experimentally infected individuals, symptoms and viral shedding show a similar pattern, but with viral shedding preceding illness by one day.

Children are much more infectious than adults and shed virus from just before they develop symptoms until two weeks after infection. In immunocompromised people, viral shedding can continue for longer than two weeks.

More information: CDC

These are the main ways that influenza spreads:

-By direct transmission, when an infected person sneezes mucus directly into the eyes, nose or mouth of another person;

-The airborne route, when someone inhales the aerosols produced by an infected person coughing, sneezing or spitting;

-Through hand-to-eye, hand-to-nose, or hand-to-mouth transmission, either from contaminated surfaces or from direct personal contact such as a hand-shake.

Reasonably effective ways to reduce the transmission of influenza include good personal health and hygiene habits such as: not touching your eyes, nose or mouth; frequent hand washing, with soap and water, or with alcohol-based hand rubs; covering coughs and sneezes; avoiding close contact with sick people; and staying home yourself if you are sick. Avoiding spitting is also recommended. Although face masks might help prevent transmission when caring for the sick, there is mixed evidence on beneficial effects in the community.

Smoking raises the risk of contracting influenza, as well as producing more severe disease symptoms.

More information: CDC

The worst pandemic in modern history was the Spanish flu of 1918, 

which killed tens of millions of people. 

Today, with how interconnected the world is, it would spread faster.

Bill Gates