Facts concerning the Flu

What is Flu?

A contagious respiratory disease, Influenza, often designated as just flu, is caused by a virus. Influenza viruses circulate all the year-round, but it is the winter season when their disturbances increase to a greater level. Thus, the falling months of the years often are referred to as the flu season. 

What happens after the virus contracts you? When do you notice the first symptoms? The duration between the contraction and the starting of the flu symptoms is the incubation period. For the majority of the times, the incubation period extends between one and four days.

Please scroll down to learn more about the flu's development and how it jumps from one person to another. 

The incubation period of the flu:

As noted above, the general incubation period lasts between one and four days, but it depends on the affected person's immunity, and thus varies from person to person. On an average level thus, the incubation period of the flue is just two days, which means the flu symptoms start to develop in a person two days after the latter's contact with the influenza virus.

Several factors can influence the duration of the incubation period, which includes:

  • The amount of virus you have come in contact with 
  • How the virus entered your body
  • Whether your body possesses the immunity to recognize the virus faster

When does the Influenza turn contagious?

When you have already been exposed to the virus, you start spreading it among other people a day before you experience the first symptoms. The process of virus shedding may start when your body releases off the virus and disperses it to the surrounding environment. You are more prone to become a catalyst of the virus on your first day of experiencing the symptoms, which means you are the most contagious on the very first day. However, your body remains contagious for the next five to six days as well.

The contagious period may extend for children, older people and those having weaker immune systems. 

The early symptoms of flu:

The flu symptoms come all of a sudden, unlike that of a common cold whose symptoms gradually develop to the forefront. Some of the common symptoms include-

  • Headache 
  • Chills
  • Dry cough
  • Extreme aches 
  • Sore throat 
  • Stuffy nose
  • Fever
  • Fatigue 

For children, nausea, vomiting and ear pain are petty common. Most often, the symptoms do not last for more than seven days, but the feeling of weakness may last for a more extended period.

How does the flu spread?

The most common method of the flu getting dispersed among all other public is through sneezing and coughing. The flu virus tends to spread through respiratory particles. Thus, if an affected person coughs and sneezes in a crowded area, people will inhale the sneeze particles and come in contact with the virus.

The tangible objects such as doorknobs and lift buttons can act as a potential vector of the influenza virus, provided they are contaminated with the virus injected respiratory 

particles.

If you are affected by the flu, you need to be cautious and follow certain norms. You need to stay at home and make limited contact till you become fine. Further, it would help if you wash your hands with soap and warm water each time you cough, sneeze or touch your face. Use a tissue or any other method to cover up your face and mouth when you cough.

Conclusion 

The flu, contagious by nature, frequents in the winter season. If you have been exposed to the virus, it will take one and four days for the symptoms to develop, while you start being contagious from one day before the symptoms show up.