'Important to know difference' professor says of cold and flu

If it seems to you as though ‘everyone’ has or has had the flu, or some sort of viral infection in recent weeks, you are not imagining it: there is a surge at present, to the extent that visitor restrictions are in place at many hospitals – including Mullingar – and staff are being asked to wear masks to protect patients as well as themselves.

Professor Paul Ridgway, interim regional clinical Director for HSE Dublin and Midlands, confirmed this week that there is a lot of sickness about.

“Every year – particularly around this time from October to April – we have ‘flu season’ and while we call it flu season, in recent years, it’s been different respiratory viruses or chest viruses that we’ve been dealing with.

“Predominantly this year, it’s all influenza, and more specifically, a bug called influenza A, so that is, as we know it, the flu proper,” Professor Ridgway told the Westmeath Examiner.

Many people say they have the flu when what they actually have is a cold – or that they have a cold when they have in fact got influenza, but there are differences, and it is important to know these differences, says Professor Ridgeway.

“The flu tends to hit a bit harder, it tends to hit a bit quicker and it tends to affect more than just the nose and the mouth and the chest: it can go and affect other parts of the body, that’s why we get very tired, we can have fevers and cramps in our legs and a sore throat and a headache as well as all the other issues that you might get with the cold,” he says.

A feature at the moment is that even when people have recovered, they are having difficulty shaking off the cough or the chestiness for a while:

“Once your lungs get irritated, the tubes in your lungs that bring air in from the mouth into your lungs and out again get irritated and the cough is caused by that irritation so it takes some time to feel very well, even sometimes up to a couple of weeks after the flu and you still have the cough.”

Of concern to medical professionals is the question of contagion: “In general, we worry about the flu from the day before you actually exhibit the symptoms and for five days afterwards, but usually once the bulk of the symptoms settle down, your risk to other people drops off very quickly,” says Professor Ridgeway.

While he stresses that the HSE emergency departments are open for those in need of professional care, most people will be able to treat themselves effectively at a home, and the advice is straightforward: seek advice from your pharmacist if your symptoms are mild, and take medications like paracetamol or other over-the-counter preparations that you can get for various colds and flu remedies.

“They’re all safe, providing you read the package – and that’s the important thing, you need to read the package and make sure that you’re taking the appropriate dose,” says Professor Ridgeway, also advising that patients stay hydrated, and that, particularly if they have a fever, that they keep warm.

“It’s very important to take plenty of fluids because you actually lose a lot of fluid through the sweat that you have associated with the temperature.”

RSV

Some of those with respiratory illnesses at the moment have RSV (respiratory syncytial virus), but that is less common than flu – and just this year, a vaccine has been launched that protects against it.

“It’s aimed at the vulnerable at the moment; it’s available privately; but for specific groups there is a plan to roll it out for next year.

“It’s a relatively new vaccine and a lot of my colleagues who treat asthma and other respiratory conditions are hopeful that it will provide an important step forward in the future, just like the vaccine for flu is very important,” says Professor Ridgeway, adding that it’s not too late to get the flu vaccine.

“People think ‘well once we’re through Christmas we don’t need to get vaccinated for flu’, but it is still important and if you haven’t been vaccinated yet, it is worthwhile getting the vaccine. It takes one to two weeks to work and to provide the protection but we do have in that vaccine the quadrivalent vaccine, which means it protects against four types of flu.”

The current outbreak of bird flu in the US is being monitored, the professor stated: “Thankfully we have effective health protection surveillance, which means that we are testing people for various different types of flu to see whether this is the standard flu that we’re seeing transmitted from person to person versus any other type of avian flus, over which there is some worry across the world.”

To date, he says, there is no evidence of that flu in humans in this country.

Weather

Professor Ridgeway concluded by advising the public to also be careful moving about in the current icy weather.”Just be careful and watch for slips and falls and all the rest of it.

And the final thing to say is you know I know there’s a lot of pressure on our EDs: a lot of the media is reporting what the pressure looks like but all our EDs are still open and available for business and we’re managing reasonably well and open for business each day.”