Information about Flu/Colds

Overview

The flu, or contagion, could be a infectious agent illness of the metabolism tract—the nose, throat, cartilaginous tube tubes and lungs—and is extremely contagious. It is spread though airborne droplets of moisture produced by coughs or sneezes. When you breathe these germs in through your nose or mouth, you may come down with the flu, generally within one to four days of exposure.

This could be a doubtless serious disease that will cause hospitalization, or, in severe cases, death. Even healthy folks will become terribly sick from the contagion. Death rates from the contagion vary from season to season. Flu-related deaths have ranged from an occasional of three,000 to a high of forty nine,000 between 1976 and 2007, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Outbreaks oft begin in school-age youngsters, WHO carry the virus home and unfold it to different teams.

And, beginning with the 2009-2010 flu season, there was a new flu to contend with—H1N1 flu (“swine flu”), which caused the first flu pandemic in more than 40 years. Since this occurrence, the seasonal contagion vaccines have enclosed coverage for the 2009 H1N1 contagion. The seasonal power contagion immunizing agent typically contains one amongst every of the 3 sorts of contagion viruses that the majority unremarkably flow into among folks today: contagion A (H1N1), contagion A (H3N2) and influenza B viruses. For the 2013-14 season, there area unit a lot of contagion immunizing agent choices out there than ever before. See thePrevention section for more information.

Flu seasons are unpredictable. The 2011-2012 contagion season affected a record low variety of individuals, however the 2012-2013 contagion season was moderately severe. The contagion season within the u. s. unremarkably peaks in January or Gregorian calendar month, however it will begin as early as Gregorian calendar month and continue into might.

Because flu can be so serious and can spread so rapidly, the CDC recommends that everyone age 6 months and older get vaccinated every year. A yearly flu vaccine is the first and most important step in protecting against flu, according to the CDC.

Vaccines are especially important to those most susceptible to flu complications, including older people, children, pregnant women, people who are morbidly obese, people with compromised immune systems and those with chronic illnesses such as heart disease, kidney disease, asthma, COPD and diabetes. The most serious, often life-threatening complication of the flu is pneumonia. Other complications embody ear infection, bronchitis, dehydration and worsening of chronic conditions, such ascongestive heart failure, asthma or diabetes. Croup and a lung disease called bronchiolitis can also arise as complications in infants and young children.

In addition, the severity of illness is increased by exposure to cigarette smoke, which can injure airways and damage the cilia, the tiny hair-like structures that help keep airways clear. Toxic fumes, industrial smoke and other air pollutants are also risk factors.

There is also evidence that influenza can be more dangerous for women in their second or third trimester of pregnancy. The strain and stress of physiological state on a woman’s lungs, combined with the kind of contagion, will cause respiratory organ issues, although there doesn’t appear to be any danger to the fetus from the influenza virus itself.

There are three strains of the flu virus:

• Type A results in severe illness that easily spreads throughout a population, even globally, affecting a large number of people at the same time.
• Type B is a generally less severe strain that tends to affect fewer people.
• Type C causes very mild symptoms, so mild that many people don’t even realize they’re sick.

The influenza virus changes its genetic makeup every year. That’s why you can get the flu every year and why a flu vaccine containing the new virus is recommended annually for everyone 6 months and older.

This constantly changing virus presents a particular challenge to medical science, making it impossible to create a single vaccine to prevent the disease. Instead, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the CDC monitor each new strain of influenza virus as it appears, assessing which may be the predominant virus in the following year’s flu season. Scientists use this data, collected by a surveillance network, to develop a vaccine each year against the specific virus they predict will predominate. For the 2013-2014 season, the standard trivalent flu vaccine contains one influenza A (H3N2) virus, one influenza A (H1N1) virus and one influenza B virus. Starting this year, there is also a quadrivalent vaccine available that contains a fourth strain, a different B virus.

Ask your health care professional for more information about restrictions and availability of flu vaccine or visit the CDC’s website: www.safegenericpharmacy.com.

In terms of prevention and treatment, drugs called neuraminidase inhibitors (NAI)—also referred to as antivirals—attack influenza viruses, at the cellular level and block the viruses’ ability to escape from cells already infected, thus preventing the infections from spreading.

These antiviral medications can also prevent the flu, which can help contain the virus in certain settings, such as family members passing the flu to one another in a household or coworkers spreading it in the workplace.

Diagnosis

Many people confuse the terms “cold” and “flu” because the illnesses share some of the same features. Both are caused by viruses that infect the respiratory tract, mainly during the winter, and both can cause symptoms such as coughing and sore throat. A cold is a minor viral infection of the nose and throat and can occur in any season. More than 200 viruses are known to cause the common cold.

It’s important to know the difference between the cold and flu because each illness is treated differently. You know you have the flu when you feel as though you’ve been hit by a truck and experience symptoms such as high fever, severe headache, muscle and body aches and extreme tiredness, along with coughing and nasal symptoms. A cold is less severe and often includes a runny nose, sneezing and coughing. Unlike flu, colds typically don’t cause fever.

Flu Symptoms

The grippe causes muscle and joint pain, high fever, a deep cough, chills, fatigue and weakness that typically send you straight to bed for 3 to 5 days or longer. Afterward, cough and tiredness may persist for days or even weeks. Other symptoms include headache, eye pain and sometimes a stuffy nose and sore throat. Some strains of the grippe additionally turn out vomit and looseness of the bowels. Symptoms typically come back on suddenly once you have been exposed to the virus.

While there is such a thing as “stomach flu,” it is not caused by the influenza virus. Most people with stomach flu are infected with one of the many gastroenteritis viruses that cause temporary nausea and vomiting.

If you have been connected with somebody UN agency has the grippe and you start to expertise flu-like symptoms, chances are you have the virus. Only your health care professional can diagnose your symptoms accurately, so it’s important to call for an appointment as soon as your symptoms develop to see if you’re a candidate for prescription antiviral medication.

If you think you’ve been exposed to someone who has the flu and you begin to experience symptoms, the CDC currently recommends you stay home and keep away from others as much as attainable and avoid travel, work, school or public places for at least 24 hours after your fever is gone (without the use of fever-reducing medication) except to get medical care or for other necessities.

If you become severely unwell otherwise you ar in one amongst the teams at high risk for complications, (children younger than five, pregnant women, people of any age with certain chronic medical conditions like respiratory disease, COPD, diabetes or heart disease, people who are immunosuppressed due to HIV infection or because they are taking immunosuppressive medications, and people over age 65), call your health care skilled or look for medical treatment.

In kids, warning signs necessitating emergency medical aid embrace quick respiration or bother breathing; dark-blue or grey skin color; not drinking enough fluids; severe or persistent vomiting; not wakening or not interacting; being therefore irritable that the kid doesn’t wish to be held; and flu-like symptoms that improve on the other hand come with fever and worsening cough.

In adults, warning signs necessitating emergency medical aid embrace problem respiration or shortness of breath; pain or pressure within the chest or abdomen; sharp dizziness; confusion; severe or persistent vomiting; and flu-like symptoms that improve but then return with fever and worsening cough.

Antiviral medications can be used to treat people who are severely ill with flu. To be effective, antiviral medications should be taken within 12 to 48 hours of the onset of symptoms.

Flu Complications

Flu often develops into acute bronchitis—an inflammation of the bronchi, the air passages or tubes to the lungs. Symptoms include:

• A fever, 100 to 102 degrees Fahrenheit.
• An irritating, dry, painful cough that starts to produce small amounts of white or light yellow sputum after two or three days; at this stage the fever often recedes, and the pain from coughing diminishes. If your sputum is yellow-green or green in color, you may have a bacterial infection.

Even after the condition improves, a slight cough commonly remains for another week or two. Most cases of acute respiratory disorder merely represent continued inflammation from infection, rather than a bacterial complication. Many people take pleasure in short use of Associate in Nursing indrawn medication like bronchodilator (Accuneb, Proventil, Ventolin or ProAir).

You usually don’t need antibiotics, regardless of how long your cough has lasted. However, if you have a cough for three weeks or more, you should be carefully evaluated to rule out pneumonia or bacterial bronchitis. If you are producing green secretions when you cough, you may have a bacterial infection and need antibiotics.

Pneumonia symptoms typically appear after you feel like you’ve just about recovered from the flu. Symptoms include:

• high fever
• shaking chills
• chest pain with each breath
• continuous hacking cough that produces thick, yellow-greenish-colored phlegm, or sputum, or sputum with blood in it
• extreme weakness and fatigue

The Flu in Children

Children are both highly likely to get the flu and the most likely to transmit it to others. In fact, studies find that:

• Children area unit additional probably than adults to urge the ill health|respiratory disorder} and to possess complications with the illness. The contagious disease is most serious in kids below age a pair of.
• Families with school-age children experience more flu infections than those without because schools are ideal locations for viruses to attack and spread. On average, regarding third of members of the family of school-aged kids area unit infected with the contagious disease every year.
• Children don’t have the maximum amount innate immunity to respiratory illness as adults as a result of they need had less period of time exposure. Also, close contact with other children in school, home and day-care settings increases a child’s risk of getting and spreading the virus.

Treatment

When you have the contagious disease, the foremost vital issue is rest. Plus, if you keep home, there is less risk that you will unfold the contagious disease to people. Flu will still be contagious for up to 5 to seven days once symptoms seem.

The following may help with flu symptoms:

• Ask your health care professional about the prescription antiviral drugs oseltamivir (Tamiflu) or zanamivir (Relenza). Antivirals attack the virus at the supply and may be started among twelve to forty eight hours from the time the primary symptoms seem to be effective. If taken among the right timeframe, antivirals will assist you feel higher quicker. Tamiflu, Associate in Nursing oral medication on the market in capsule or liquid type, is approved for folks one year and older. Relenza, Associate in Nursing inhaled medication, is approved for folks seven years and older. Side effects are mild and may include nausea and, less commonly, vomiting. Relenza may cause some nasal irritation.
• Drink plenty of fluids. Hot liquids may relieve the feeling of congestion and loosen phlegm.
• Take a pain reliever like acetaminophen for aches and fever. However, don’t use aspirin or products containing aspirin on anyone under 19 years of age, because there is a strong link between aspirin and Reye’s Syndrome, a disease that affects all body organs, particularly the brain and liver, in children.
• Take a cough drug for relief from a dry, hacking cough once making an attempt to sleep. A cough that produces secretion or phlegm isn’t essentially a signal of contagious disease, however it is a signal of a chilly or different health problem. If you are coughing up phlegm, you may have developed a secondary bacterial infection that needs to be treated by a health care professional. Don’t use a suppressant if you are coughing up mucus; it’s important that you get those substances out of your lungs.
• Use a humidifier, respirator or steamer in the bedroom to help ease congestion.

Because the contagious disease could be a infection, it cannot be treated with antibiotics. Antibiotics solely kill microorganism and so area unit useless against the contagious disease. Taking antibiotics when you don’t need them contributes to an important public health problem—antibiotic resistance. Some diseases that were once simply cured by antibiotics became proof against treatment. For example, earlier this century, antibiotics nearly eliminated dreaded bacterial diseases like tuberculosis and gonorrhea. However, years of widespread misuse have allowed “antibiotic-resistant” forms of these illnesses to become more common.

Prevention

To avoid getting the flu or to reduce its severity, the CDC now recommends all people age 6 months and older get a flu shot as soon as it is available each fall. Vaccination is particularly vital for folks at high risk for complications from the contagious disease, including those who are pregnant, are age 65 or older, have a chronic health problem, are health care workers or live or work around the elderly. The immunogen helps your system defend the contagious disease virus once you are exposed.

If you’re allergic to eggs or running a fever, don’t get a vaccine without talking first with your health care professional. The flu vaccine has been shown to be completely safe to take during pregnancy, but again, discuss this with your health care professional. The most common aspect result of the immunogen is soreness at the location of the injection. Essentially everybody will receive the contagious disease immunogen, but it is important if you have concerns to discuss these issues with your health care provider.

While the vaccine itself cannot cause the flu, you could be exposed to the flu within two weeks after vaccination, before you have time to develop antibodies or immune resistance. Then, when you get sick, you might think the vaccine caused it.

Because your system desires many weeks to retort to the immunogen, the best time to get vaccinated is in October or November since most flu activity occurs in January or later. Some contagious disease seasons will last as late as might, and the 2009 H1NI flu was reported even in summer. No matter the date, it’s still worth getting vaccinated any time during flu season. You start to develop some immunity from the vaccine within a few days to two weeks.

Planning Ahead: Recommendations for Flu Vaccinations

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends that everyone 6 months and older get vaccinated against the flu. There are several types of flu vaccinations available:

• A standard trivalent flu shot, which protects against the three strains of flu that researchers anticipate will be the most common that season; approved for people ages 6 months and older
• A standard trivalent flu shot grown in cell culture; approved for people 18 and olderv
• A quadrivalent vaccine that protects against the same three viruses in the trivalent vaccine, plus another B virus
• A nasal spray vaccine that uses a live virus, available in trivalent and quadrivalent versions; approved for people 2 through 49 who do not have an underlying medical condition that may make them susceptible to flu complications, such as a weakened immune system, heart or lung disease, kidney problems, diabetes or pregnancy; children 2 through 17 who take aspirin or medicines containing aspirin also shouldn’t get the nasal spray
• A thimerosal-free vaccine

While everybody ought to get a immunogen every contagious disease season, it’s notably vital certainly teams to urge immunised as a result of they’re in danger for serious flu-related complications or they live with or care for people at risk for developing these complications. These groups include:

• pregnant women
• children younger than age five, but especially children younger than two
• people age 65 or over
• anyone with chronic medical conditions, especially asthma or chronic bronchitis and emphysema
• anyone in a long-term care facility or nursing home
• anyone who lives with or cares for those at high risk of complications from flu, including:

• health care workers
• household contacts and out-of-home caregivers of children younger than 6 months
• people within regular contact with those at risk for flu complications

The above recommendations do not apply to live-active-influenza-virus-type vaccines. FluMist and FluMist Quadrivalent, intranasal live-active flu vaccines that prevent the same flu strains as the inactive vaccines, are options for children at least two years old and adults up to age 49.

The live-vaccine nasal sprays appear to be as effective as injected flu vaccine, although they cost more and should not be given to certain people including pregnant or breastfeeding women, people with weakened immune systems and certain other ailments or conditions. Talk to your health care provider to see if it’s right for you.

If you or a family member wants to receive a flu vaccine but cannot locate a source, you can search by zip code at the following American Lung Association Web site: http://www.lung.org/lung-disease/influenza/flu-vaccine-finder/.

In addition, some public clinics offer the vaccine. Ask your health care professional for more information about restrictions and availability of the flu vaccine.

Who Should Not Be Vaccinated

There are some people who should not be vaccinated with injected influenza vaccine, according to the CDC. These include those who:

• are under 6 months of age
• have a severe allergy to chicken eggs, although your allergist can likely immunize you safely, and there are some egg-free vaccines available
• have had a severe reaction to a previous influenza vaccination
• developed Guillain-Barré syndrome within six weeks of getting an influenza vaccine
• have a fever (wait until your fever subsides)

Prescription Antiviral Medication for Flu Prevention

Prescription antiviral medications, used as an adjunct to vaccination, may be extremely helpful in preventing the onset of flu. If you’ve got been around somebody UN agency has the grippe, a doctor can prescribe antiviral medication to help prevent you from catching the virus. However, it is important to contact the doctor quick, as antiviral medication ought to be taken inside the primary twelve to forty eight hours of exposure to the virus. After taking oseltamivir (Tamiflu) inside forty eight hours of the primary look of grippe symptoms, adults felt higher thirty p.c quicker (within one.3 days) than adults with the grippe UN agency did not take the medication. And children taking Tamiflu felt higher twenty six p.c quicker (within one.5 days) than children who didn’t take the medication.

According to the federal agency, it is important that antiviral medication be used early to treat those that area unit in danger for developing serious complications from the grippe, such as the very young and also the terribly recent and other people with sure speculative medical conditions, or for those that area unit terribly sick with the grippe. Other people may additionally be treated with antiviral medication this season. However, the general public UN agency return down with the grippe and area unit otherwise healthy don’t got to take antiviral medication.

Use of antivirals is dependent on availability. If Tamiflu and Relenza become in short supply, they may first be given to people who have been hospitalized or are at risk for severe complications from the flu.

Minimizing Your Risk

Here are several simple common-sense things you can do to protect yourself from the flu and to help prevent the spread of the flu virus:

• Cover your mouth and nose when you sneeze or cough and teach your children to do the same. Use tissues, not handkerchiefs, and dispose of the tissue after one use. Also, try not to touch your mouth, nose or eyes to avoid spreading germs.
• Keep your distance (at least three feet), if possible, from people who have the flu, because the virus is spread when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
• Wash your hands often to cut back your risk of catching a chilly or grippe. Ordinary soap is sufficient. If soap and water don’t seem to be offered, use an alcohol-based hand cleaner. Antibacterial soaps add little protection, particularly against viruses. In fact, a study suggests that though hand laundry with soap reduced the quantity of pneumonia-related infections in youngsters underneath 5 by fifty p.c, and there was no difference in the results once antibacterial drug soap was used rather than regular soap.
• Avoid second-hand cigarette smoke and, if you smoke, try to quit.
• Try to maintain a healthy mode to create your immunity by following a nourishing diet, getting enough sleep, drinking lots of water and minimizing stress. Eating ample fruits and vegetables, which are rich in antioxidants and other important plant-based chemicals, may help strengthen your immune system.
• If you are sick with flu-like illness, the CDC recommends you stay home for at least 24 hours after your fever is gone (without the aid of fever-reducing medication) except to get medical care or for other necessities.

The flavoring remedy genus Echinacea gets tons of attention for its claims to forestall colds and grippe or for minimizing symptoms, if they do develop. However, most studies on this herb notice no edges once it involves preventing either colds or grippe. Studies do notice, however, that using echinacea at the beginning of a cold can reduce the length and intensity of the illness. Because there are not any standards or qc offered for supplements like genus Echinacea (including what a part of the plant is employed within the supplement) and a few supplements could cause toxic facet effects in giant doses, you should always discuss natural remedies with your health care professional before taking them.

There is no proof that enormous doses of antioxidant stop or cure colds or the grippe. However, many studies notice that metallic element lozenges could cut back the length and intensity of colds and grippe. Gels and nasal sprays containing metallic element recently came under attack from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. In 2009, the government agency warned customers to not use 3 zinc-containing product administered through the nose. Those 3 product (Zicam Cold Remedy Nasal Gel and Zicam Cold Remedy Swabs for adults and kids) could cause loss of sense of smell.

Facts to Know

1. Influenza, or the flu, could be a infectious agent malady of the metabolic process tract—the nose, throat, cartilaginous tube tubes and lungs. It’s similar to a cold in that both are caused by viruses that infect the respiratory tract, mainly in the winter season, and both can cause symptoms such as coughing and sore throat. A cold is a minor viral infection of the nose and throat, and its primary symptoms are nasal stuffiness, sneezing, runny nose, sore throat and cough. Influenza is more serious, and its major symptoms are high fever, severe aches and pains, cough with mucus production, tiredness and weakness.

2. The flu is highly contagious and is spread though airborne droplets of moisture produced when someone with the flu coughs or sneezes. When you breathe these germs, you will return down with the influenza, typically inside one to four days of being exposed.

3. Rates of contagion infection vary among age teams and from one season to a different, consistent with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

4. influenza seasons square measure unpredictable, and in some years, influenza outbreaks square measure severe. The CDC estimates that over a period of 31 years, the number of flu-related deaths has ranged from a low of about 3,000 to a high of about 49,000 Americans.

5. Smoking can increase your risk for the flu and complications from the flu, because smoking injures your airways and damages the cilia, tiny hair-like structures that help keep the airways clear.

6. The foremost serious, typically serious complication of the influenza is respiratory disorder. Other complications include ear infection, bronchitis, dehydration and worsening of chronic conditions, such as congestive heart failure, asthma or diabetes. Croup and a lung disease called bronchiolitis can develop as complications in infants and young children.

7. The contagion virus changes its genetic makeup from year to year, which means that each year you’re likely exposed to a new virus. That’s why you’ll get the influenza per annum, and why a flu vaccine is recommended annually. Vaccines, that square measure created with killed or inactivated virus or infectious agent fragments of these strains, work by forcing the immune system to make antibodies that fight circulating strains of influenza.

8. A influenza vaccination is your best likelihood to guard yourself against the influenza. You should get a seasonal influenza immunizing agent per annum as a result of the influenza immunizing agent is developed to stay up with perpetually dynamical influenza viruses.

9. The nasal mist influenza immunizing agent, FluMist and FluMist Quadrivalent, are also available from your health care professional. This live-active influenza-virus-type immunizing agent is suggested for kids a minimum of age two and adults up to the age of forty nine. It is effective in preventing an equivalent influenza varieties contained within the inactive injectable versions of the influenza immunizing agent.

10. Prescription antiviral medications, such as oseltamivir (Tamiflu) and zanamivir (Relenza), can be used to treat and prevent the flu if used within 12 to 48 hours of symptom onset or exposure to the virus.

Key Q&A

1. Why should I get a flu vaccine? Isn’t there a chance it could give me the flu?

A respiratory illness vaccination is your best likelihood to guard yourself against the respiratory illness. People don’t get the respiratory illness from a respiratory illness vaccinum, however some those that have immunity against one in every of the respiratory illness proteins contained within the respiratory illness vaccinum will feel achy for a day or so after the vaccine. This is not the flu.

2. What is the difference between vaccine and antivirals?

Vaccination is that the 1st line of defense against the respiratory illness. Adults and youngsters over vi months older ought to have a respiratory illness vaccinum annually. The respiratory illness vaccinum helps the body build antibodies that offer you with immunity to the respiratory illness. However, the respiratory illness vaccinum isn’t one hundred pc effective. If you get immunised however still come back down with the respiratory illness, raise your doctor regarding prescription antiviral medications. Antivirals attack the virus at the supply and might assist you feel higher quicker. It is necessary to recollect that antivirals should be taken inside twelve to forty eight hours of symptom onset for best effectiveness.

3. I feel awful. Why won’t my health care professional prescribe antibiotics for me?

Because the respiratory illness may be a infection, it cannot be treated with antibiotics. Antibiotics solely kill microorganism and therefore area unit useless against the respiratory illness. Taking antibiotics after you do not want them contributes to antibiotic resistance—an progressively common and threate trend wherever disease-causing microorganism now not answer treatment. However, your health care skilled will bring down antiviral medication. If taken inside twelve to forty eight hours of symptom onset, antivirals will facilitate reduce malady|respiratory disorder} symptoms and therefore the period of the illness.

4. When I blow my nose, the mucus is greenish. Doesn’t this mean I have an infection and need antibiotics?

A “green” runny nose is not necessarily an indication of a bacterial infection, but it could be. You should check with your health care professional. Persistent inexperienced secretions lasting on the far side 5 to seven days will indicate a sinus infection, in which case you may need antibiotics.

5. What medications are available for influenza?

Antiviral medications, such as oseltamivir (Tamiflu) and zanamivir (Relenza), can be prescribed by a health care professional to both treat and prevent influenza. These prescription medications will shorten the period of respiratory illness by one to 2 days and will scale back complications, including pneumonia and bronchitis. Additionally, if you’ve been exposed to the flu, you can take antiviral medication to prevent coming down with the virus. However, for best effectiveness, antiviral medication should be started within 12 to 48 hours of symptom onset or exposure.

Note: ne’er offer acetylsalicylic acid to a feverish kid underneath age nineteen WHO has the respiratory illness. Reye’s syndrome is a severe and potentially fatal illness that affects children, following use of aspirin-containing products for viral infections. Reye’s syndrome affects all the organs, most severely the liver and the brain. A child’s risk for developing this disease is markedly lowered by avoiding aspirin use whenever they have a viral infection.

6. How can I tell if I have the flu or a cold?

The symptoms of the flu come on suddenly and include a fever (usually high), headache, muscle aches, severe deep cough with mucus production, tiredness, weakness and chest discomfort. Sometimes it involves a stuffy nose, sneezing and sore throat. A cold, on the other hand, rarely causes a fever, headache, extreme exhaustion or severe aches and pains. Its most prominent symptoms are a stuffy nose, runny nose with clear secretions, sneezing, sore throat and a mild to moderate cough.

7. When do I need to call my health care professional?

It’s important to contact your health care supplier if you expertise respiratory illness symptoms or if you have been exposed to the virus. To be effective at treating or preventing the flu, prescription antiviral medications, such as oseltamivir (Tamiflu) and zanamivir (Relenza), should be taken within 12 to 48 hours of symptom onset or exposure. You should decision your health care skilled if you develop these hallmark malady|respiratory disorder} symptoms: o fast onset of sickness o associate illness thus dangerous you are feeling entirely drained and immobile o a high and persistent fever, over 101 degrees Fahrenheit o severe aches and pains, which can include headache o fatigue and weakness that persists o chest pain other than over your windpipe o coughing up thick or discolored mucus o facial swelling or pain o earache In the meantime, the CDC recommends you stay home and keep away from differents the maximum amount as doable for a minimum of twenty four hours once your fever is gone (without the employment of fever-reducing medication) except to urge treatment or for other necessities.

8. Does chicken soup really help?

There is nothing healthful or supernatural regarding soup. However, heat liquids will facilitate divide your chest congestion, helping you feel better.

9. I started to feel better, but then my symptoms came back with more severe coughing, chest pain and redevelopment of fever. Did I relapse?

It’s not uncommon for the respiratory illness to guide to respiratory illness. These cases of pneumonia result when bacteria, viruses and other organisms invade the lungs and cause them to become inflamed. The body’s defense mechanisms ordinarily prevent these bacteria from reaching the lungs, but when the defenses are weakened, by the flu, severe pneumonia may develop. Bacterial respiratory illness symptoms can seem once you begin feeling like you are convalescent from the respiratory illness. A brief period of improvement is followed by the sudden onset of: o high fever o shaking chills o chest pain with each breath o a continuous hacking cough that produces thick, yellow-greenish-colored phlegm, or sputum; or sputum with blood in it o extreme weakness and fatigue.

You should perpetually confer with your health care skilled promptly if you’ve got these symptoms.