This is a reply I posted in response to a post by the Lazy Iguana. I decided to duplicate it here, because unlike my previous post, this is news you can use!
Unless there is a really heinous potentially deadly even to normally healthy people strain of the flu going around, I do not get the flu shot. All this annoying medical training has taught me one thing: the new anti-viral medications are very safe and very effective. The one caveat is that you have to take them as soon as you realize you're really sick. Not just the coughing-stuffy head-sore throat-minor upper chest congestion kind of sick. The kind where you have a cough that feels like you're going to hack up one of your lungs, which will probably feel like you inhaled water. Also there is usually fever and muscle ache with the flu. There isn't a stuffy nose. There might be a sore throat, but it's usually from coughing. At any rate, get ye to the doctor and ask for an antiviral. It won't destroy the viruses that are already in your system but will stop them from replicating so you will get well faster. Rather expensive stuff but very effective. One of the few medications to come along where I've said "this stuff really rules!"
2 comments:
My son's teacher actually broke a rib through coughing. Now that's what I call a cold!...
It wasn't from being sick, it was a side effect from a blood pressure med, but my mother nearly passed out from coughing so hard one time.
I'll never forget what it felt like when I had pneumonia. It was only in one lung, luckily, or I'd probably have been in the hospital. It literally felt like I was trying to breathe water. Between the coughing and the inhaled steroid that the doctor put me on, I ended up irritating my larynx so bad that when the cold air hit it seized up to the point where it felt like I was breathing through a cocktail straw and I ended up in the ER. I still get the heebie jeebies when I think about that!
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