THE FLU
The Flu is the common name influenza which is a virus that attacks the respiratory system. The flu virus releases its genetic information into the cells nucleus to replicate itself. When the cell dies, those copies are released and they affect other cells throughout the rest of the body. With that happening the virus weakens the immune system. When your sick with the flu, your body builds up a defense by making antibodies against it. The flu virus spreads through air when a person coughs, sneezes, or speaks.
The Flu was first founded in Seattle September, 1918. The avian flu can also be known as the “Bird Flu”. The bird flu is being passed around by migratory birds. It can be transmitted from birds to mammals and in some limited circumstances to humans. The flu will also be known as the H5N1 virus. The H5N1 virus has raised concerns about a potential human pandemic because its virulent (deadly; extremely dangerous) and it can evolve like other influenza viruses. As many other viruses and illnesses the flu can be a lot more deadlier. When you get the flu the lungs are severely harmed from infected cells called macrophages and T-cells. The virus can spread way beyond the lungs but generally do not. Many people catch the flu and think they have the common cold because of some of the same symptoms. But actually the flu can be more dangerous if you don’t treat it immediately.
Ways to prevent the flu:
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Wash your hands thoroughly and frequently
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Never pick up used tissues
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Never share cups and/or used utensils
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Always cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you cough or sneeze
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Stay home when you get sick
Research also says that after 5 days the fever and other symptoms have disappeared but a cough and weakness may continue. Usually all symptoms are gone within a week or two. But its important to treat the flu seriously because it can lead to other viruses such as pneumonia and other life-threatening complications. For the most part it appears in infants, senior citizens, and people with long term health problems. People with the flu may not know but they are actually contagious from a day before they feel sick. It would usually be one week for adults and two weeks for young kids.
Anyone at any age can have serious complications with the flu but those at high risk are people over 50 years old, children between 6 months and 2 years, women more than 3 months pregnant the flu season, anyone living in a long-term care facility, and anyone with chronic heart, lung or kidney conditions, diabetes, or weakened immune system.
I wanted to know what, exactly, the flu was and how it became so deadly. So, after I ate at one of Europe’s fine restaurants, I decided to ask another European citizen what they knew about the 1918 pandemic. Her name was Nancy and she gave me what I needed. She said that the flu is a disease that affects our Respiratory System. Also, she said that the reason it was so deadly was because it would take over your lungs, resulting in pneumonia. She even told me that her great-great-grandmother was one of the people who didn’t get infected, but was still impacted by all of the deaths that occurred during that time of events. About one-third of the world was corrupted, or infected, with this
The Influenza virus is a unique respiratory viral disease that can have serious economic and social disruption to society. The virus is airborne transmitted through droplets release by coughing or sneezing from an infected person or by touching infected surfaces. Symptoms range from mild to severe and may even result in death. People with the virus usually experience fever, headache, shivering, muscle pain and cough, which can lead to more severe respiratory illness such as pneumonia. People most susceptible to the flu virus are elderly individuals and young children as well as anyone whose health or immune system has been compromise. The most effective way to counteract the influenza virus is to get the flu vaccine which is available by shots or nasal spray before the flu season as well as practicing safe hygiene. (CDC, 2013)
How does it work? Once you are given the flu shot, it sort of “tricks” your immune system into thinking that it has been infected by the flu. Therefore, your body produces antibodies against the virus. These antibodies bind to the flu virus and aim at it for destruction. Then, when someone actually does come in contact with the real live virus, the body is armed and ready to fight off the illness before it even st...
The influenza virus is most commonly spread from person to person by coughing or sneezing. The virus can also be spread by touching an object that was recently contaminated. Then accidently touching their mouth or
From the time of its first recorded incident in 412 BC (Adams 1) to 1918, influenza was never taken seriously. With symptoms similar to the common cold, most people disregarded influenza as a minor illness, nothing more. As Lynette Iezzoni quoted in her book, Influenza 1918, influenza was thought to be “quite a Godsend! Everybody ill, nobody dying” besides the very old and feeble (16). However, the influenza virus was out to prove them wrong in the influenza pandemic of 1918.
Influenza is very contagious and spreads rapidly from person to person. Influenza causes worldwide yearly epidemics. According to World Health organization Influenza affects 5-15% world’s population and resulting in 500,000 deaths yearly. Ottenberg stated that, in United States, an average of 200,000 were hospitalized and 36,000 died each year from influenza complications. Influenza is the sixth leading cause of death among US adults and is related to 1 in 20 death in persons older than 65 years. Disease control and prevention estimates indicate that infections like H1N1 which is one of the types of influenza, have resulted in an estimated 42 to 86 million cases and 8520 to 17620 deaths. As I mentioned earlier that infections like influenza are very contagious, they can spread easily from hcw to Patient and back to hcw. The most efficient and effective method of preventing influenza infection is vaccination(The best way to prevent influenza is with annual vaccination).(Sullivan,2010) (Gregory,Tosh &Jacobson, 2005). Motivated by a desire to actively avoid illness Influenza may increase the risk for death in people with existing heart, lung, or circulation disorders. In fact, the higher than average number of winter deaths in people with heart disease may be due only to the occurrence of influenza during those months.Vaccination provides immunity to fight against infection.To increase resistance to harm by modifying the environment to minimize preventable illness (NEED TO CHANGE WORDING)
Medical officials agree that one of the characteristic features of the influenza is its air-born infectivity. "One case to-day may mean a hundred to-morrow and thousands within a week," according to the chief medical officer of the Local Government Board. To protect oneself against the infectious illness that can spread without direct contact with the sick, it is recommended that people situate themselves in well-ventilated rooms. However, once you have contracted the disease, you are to quarantine yourself in an isolated home.5 Other symptoms of influenza include extreme exhaustion, aching limbs, headaches and sometimes, inflammation of nasal mucous membranes.6
Ng, Sophia, et al. "The Effect Of Age And Recent Influenza Vaccination History On The Immunogenicity And Efficacy Of 2009-10 Seasonal Trivalent Inactivated Influenza Vaccination In Children." Plos One 8.3 (2013): e59077. MEDLINE. Web. 15 Nov. 2013.
Influenza is defined as an acute, commonly epidemic disease, occurring in several forms, caused by numerous rapidly mutating viral strains and characterized by respiratory symptoms and general prostration. Spanish flu was more than just a normal epidemic, it was a pandemic. Epidemics affect many people at the same time in areas where the disease doesn’t normally occur. A pandemic is an epidemic on a national, international, or global scale. The Spanish flu was different from the seasonal flu in one especially frightening way, there was an unusually high death rate among healthy adults aged 15 to 34 and lowered the life expectancy by more than ten years. Such a high death rate has not occurred in this age group in and epidemic prior to or since the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918. (Tumpey, 2005)
Influenza or flu is caused by RNA viruses of the family orthomyxoviridae, that affects the nose, throat, and lungs- the respiratory system. The common symptoms are: fever and respiratory problems, such as cough, sore throat,stuffy nose, as well as headaches and muscle aches. Influenza viruses are spread mainly by droplets made from people coughing, sneezing or talking while having the flu. These droplets can land in the mouths or noses of people or can inhaled into the lungs. It is least common for the virus to spread by touching an infected surface then their mouth or nose. Flu viruses are divided into 3 categories, A, B, C. A and B are responsible for problems in the respiratory system that typically occurs during the winter. Influenza types C is quite different from A and B. Type C only cause mild respiratory symptom or none at all.
Influenza is an acute respiratory illness caused by infection of influenza A and B viruses. The disease can affect both the upper and lower respiratory tract and is often followed by systemic signs and symptoms, such as: sudden onset of fever, chills, non-productive cough, myalgias (muscle pain), headache, nasal congestion, sore throat, and fatigue. (Cox et al.1998). Influenza viruses evolve continuously, challenging mammalian and avian hosts with new variants and causing complex epidemic patterns with regard to age, place, and time. Human influenza viruses cause disease through a variety of direct and indirect pathological effects. The direct effects include destruction of infected cells, damage to respiratory epithelium, and immunological responses that cause general malaise and pneumonia. Indirect effects of infection include secondary bacterial infections due to the tissue damage and other disease such as cardiovascular disease, renal disease, diabetes or chronic pulmonary disease (Schoenbaum S.1996). In the USA, clinical illness affects 5–20% of the population and asymptomatically infects a larger number (Noble G.1982). Infants, who are exposed to influenza epidemics as a novel antigenic challenge after maternal antibodies decline, may have attack rates as high as 30–50% in their first year of life, depending on the frequency of contacts with older siblings (Glezen et al.1997). For reasons, influenza viruses cause epidemics in the northern and southern hemisphere during their respective winters. In the tropics, the timing of activity is less defined, with sometimes year-round circulation or bi-seasonal peaks during the year (Viboud et al.2006).
Today the flu we have is not as deadly as it was in 1918. Now we have medicines and vaccines for the flu, but still today about 200 thousand people in America are hospitalized. Still about 30-40 thousand Americans die from the flu every year. The flu in 1918 was called Influenza Pandemic, also known as the Spanish Influenza, but there’s no proof that the virus came from Spain.
Influenza is a very serious disease that can lead to hospitalization and even fatalities. There are many different strands, infecting people of all ages and originating from different animals, which can be extremely fatal if the right care isn’t provided. Care for flu patients have changes tremendously over the years from once having no vaccine to having a limited amount of vaccines, only for the most prone individuals, to now having yearly vaccines to prevent the most common cases of flu. Doctors have learned just how deadly the flu virus can be which has led to the importance of them educating their patients of the flu virus and explaining the importance of getting the vaccine in order for their bodies to get an immunity of the many flu viruses that many in our country have previously faced. Many in our county in the past have died from the H1N1 virus due to no vaccines, poor precautions, and being uneducated on the virus because it was new, but new vaccines and precautions are being taken in order to prevent pandemics such as the Flu Pandemic of 1918.
Every year, flu viruses make people sick. Even a garden-variety flu may kill people, but usually only the very young or the very old. In 1918, the flu mutated into something much more deadly. Infecting 500 million people and killing 50-100 million of them, the strain of that type of flu was hastened by World War 1, which increased the lethality of the virus, giving that flu many opportunities to spread during World War 1. At the time that the flu was spreading, science wasn’t advanced enough to find a cure, and medical personnel was extremely helpless when it came to trying to fight the disease. Personnel, however, did find that the 1918 flu involved the H1N1 virus that kills through a cytokine storm (an overreaction of the bodies immune system).
The swine influenza or swine flu is a respiratory disease in pigs that is caused by the type A influenza viruses. These viruses are referred to as swine flu viruses but scientifically the main virus is called the swine triple reassortant (tr) H1N1 influenza virus. When the viruses infect humans they are called variant viruses. This infection has been caused in humans mainly by the H1N1v virus in the United States. The H1N1 virus originates in animals due to improper conditions and the food they ingest. The virus stays in latency form, thus harmless to the respective animal. The longer the animals survive the more likely the virus is to develop and strengthen making it immune to vaccines. The virus reproduced through the lytic cycle. The virus injects its own nucleic acids into a host cell and then they form a circle in the center of the cell. Rather than copying its own nucleic acids, the cell will copy the viral acids. The copies of viral acids then organize themselves as viruses inside of the cell. The membrane will eventually split leaving the viruses free to infect other cells.