Growing up I remember any time anyone got sick with something that involved throwing up, it was said that they “had the flu.” As an adult, however, I’m led to believe that what we always called “the flu” was more likely a random virus, and that actually having “influenza” is much more rare.
So my question is… how likely is it that I’ve even ever had the “real” flu even one time? How common is it in the general population?
from the CDC about Seasonal Influenza: http://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/qa/disease.htm
That’s every year?
Common usage calls vomiting/gut rumbles/runs “stomach flu.” Actual influenza virus doesn’t do this. What people call “stomach flu” is typically a belly virus or food poisoning. That salmonella is everywhere!
Influenza is high fever, chills, sore throat, and coughing. Complications arising from the flu include sinus infections and bronchitis and pneumonia, so those symptoms can overlap with the actual flu symptoms.
Virulent flu (such as the 1918 worldwide flu pandemic) can cause death within 24 hours of infection. The virus can literally destroy lung tissue, and the patient drowns in his own blood.
~VOW
Yep.
And of course, having only a sore throat and coughing isn’t the flu. In France, we don’t talk about “stomach flu” (we have a medically non existing “liver crisis” instead) but quite often any cold a bit more serious than usual is called a “flu” (which might be the reason why so many people think that vaccination commonly doesn’t prevent it).
Even a mild case of actual flu is likely to be memorable enough for you to never miss a vaccination after that (since I’m 25 or so in my case). It’s real bad as (usually) non life-threatening diseases go. That’s the first time I had a house call because I just wasn’t able to go to the doctor’s (or leave home, or most of the time simply leave my bed).
So, I guess that if the OP has had the “real flu”, she would know.
See, though, this is the part I don’t get. I keep seeing posts that say more or less what you’ve just said, that “real flu” is extremely serious in a can’t-even-think-about-getting-out-of-bed sort of way and anything milder is not influenza but just a cold, but this seems inconsistent with the CDC figures given above. I’m pretty sure that a fifth of the people I know are not getting that sick during a typical year. (Granted, I mostly know youngish, non-immunocompromised people, but still.)
This is an attitude I have only experienced on the Dope.
If I have fever and chills and I’m puking for three days, it’s not the flu. I’m an idiot and it’s just food poisoning, even if I have eaten all of my meals with others who didn’t react.
If I have fever and chills and I’m puking for seven days, than it’s the flu, but only if it’s the worst thing I have ever experienced in my life.
It seems to be a pretty simplistic attitude towards a virus that’s constantly mutating. If it can periodically mutate killer strains, why couldn’t it mutate a three day strain? Or why couldn’t the initial infection start slow enough that your body’s defenses are a few days ahead when the virus hits you?
Same here. I used to think a bad cold was flu until I got “real flu” and spent a week in bed with a resting heart rate of 100. Haven’t had anything like it since, and never been vaccinated either.
I did have swine flu last year though, and it really wasn’t all that bad. Apparently, almost half the UK population caught swine flu, and most were blissfully unaware of it.
The term “stomach flu” is a bad one, it has nothing to do with the flu virus. Seasonal flu doesn’t cause vomiting and diarrhoea, at least not in adults, although it looks like swine flu does in some cases.
Why do you associate puking with the flu? It is not one of the common symptoms.