Cover Your Cough - Prevent flu

Cover Your Cough

Stop the spread of germs that can make you and others sick!
Influenza (flu) and other serious respiratory illnesses like respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), whooping cough, and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) are spread by cough, sneezing, or unclean hands.
To help stop the spread of germs,
Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you cough or sneeze.
Put your used tissue in the waste basket.
If you don't have a tissue, cough or sneeze into your upper sleeve or elbow, not your hands.
You may be asked to put on a facemask to protect others.
Wash your hands often with soap and warm water for 20 seconds.
If soap and water are not available, use an alcohol-based hand rub.

The Flu Series - Part 1

Reference Source: CDC
Image source: http://www.nationaljewish.org


What is influenza (also called flu)?
The flu is a contagious respiratory illness caused by influenza viruses that infect the nose, throat, and lungs. It can cause mild to severe illness, and at times can lead to death. The best way to prevent the flu is by getting a flu vaccine each year.
Signs and symptoms of flu
People who have the flu often feel some or all of these signs and symptoms:
Fever* or feeling feverish/chills
Cough
Sore throat
Runny or stuffy nose
Muscle or body aches
Headaches
Fatigue (very tired)
Some people may have vomiting and diarrhea, though this is more common in children than adults.
*It’s important to note that not everyone with flu will have a fever.

How flu spreads?
Most experts believe that flu viruses spread mainly by droplets made when people with flu cough, sneeze or talk. These droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people who are nearby. Less often, a person might also get flu by touching a surface or object that has flu virus on it and then touching their own mouth, eyes or possibly their nose.

FUNNY flu... facts

Structure of the influenza virion.

The word “influenza” comes from the Italian influentia because of the belief that the influence of the planets, stars, and moon caused the flu— reasons for sudden and widespread sickness


“Cures” for the Spanish flu included drinking whiskey, smoking cigars, eating milk toast, gargling with salt water, getting fresh air, and partaking of interesting concoctions like “Grippura.” Some doctors doused their patients with icy water while others “bled” their patients. Yet other doctors tried surgery by slicing open a patient’s chest, spreading his ribs, and extracting pus and blood from the pleural cavity (the cavity surrounding the lungs), which was almost always fatal in flu victims


The English adopted the word “influenza” in the mid-eighteenth century, while the French called it la grippe from gripper, meaning “to grasp or hook.” There is also a similar-sounding phrase in Arabic, anf-al-anza, which means “nose of the goat,” used because goats were thought to be carriers of the disease


Viruses (from the Latin virus meaning “poison, slimy liquid”) are much simpler than bacteria. Viruses are just inert bundles of genetic material encased in a shell called a capsid or a fatty membrane called an envelope. The flu, for example, is caused by an RNA virus of the family Orthomyxoviridae (from the Greek orthos meaing “straight” and myxa meaning “mucous”).

The source of flu vaccines are chickens and, consequently, vaccines can be dangerous to people who are allergic to eggs. Those people should never receive the injectable or nasal spray vaccine without doctor’s approval