As predictable as Santa arriving on Dec. 25 is the flu rearing its ugly head about the same time. But a variant this year seems to be leading to rapid spread.<\/p>\n
DALLAS \u2014 The busiest places in North Texas once holiday get-togethers come to an end might be emergency rooms and urgent care clinics.<\/p>\n
The CDC tracks flu cases across the country, and Texas recently jumped from low to moderate flu activity.<\/p>\n
The week of Dec. 14, Children\u2019s Health saw a systemwide 175% increase in flu cases from the week prior.<\/p>\n
Dr. Jeffrey Kahn, chief of infectious diseases at Children’s Health and a professor of pediatrics and microbiology at UT Southwestern, says the season is in its earliest stages.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf this is like previous seasons, we’re in for several more months of influenza,\u201d Kahn said.<\/p>\n
Scientists are tracking a variant called subclade K, which seems to be evading some of the immunity afforded by flu vaccines.<\/p>\n
People describe a rapid onset of symptoms.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the calling card for influenza,\u201d Kahn said. \u201cYou’re feeling well, and then six hours later you feel like you’ve been hit by a truck. You’ve got a high fever. You can’t get out of bed. It’s the worst feeling you’ve ever had in your life. And that’s influenza.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kahn said there\u2019s high value in low-tech solutions: \u00a0stay home if you are starting to feel under the weather, keep your kids home if they aren\u2019t well, wash your hands and use hand sanitizer.<\/p>\n
He also said hosts of family gatherings should frequently wipe down high-touch surfaces like doorknobs and refrigerator handles.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomebody rubs their nose and then opens the door, well that doorknob is now contaminated,\u201d he said \u00a0<\/p>\n
His number-one suggestion for protection is a flu shot.<\/p>\n
It won\u2019t provide protection during holiday celebrations, but kicks in within 7 to 10 days, which is about when kids will return to school.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Shots are not a guarantee.<\/p>\n
You can still catch the flu \u2013 especially because of the subvariant.<\/p>\n
But Kahn said being vaccinated means you\u2019ll almost certainly have a milder case.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome effectiveness from the flu vaccine is better than zero effectiveness,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As predictable as Santa arriving on Dec. 25 is the flu rearing its ugly head about the same…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":473075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5138],"tags":[5229,7371,7372,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-473074","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-worth","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-fort-worth","10":"tag-fortworth","11":"tag-texas","12":"tag-tx","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-united-states-of-america","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","17":"tag-us","18":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115786627564922724","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/473074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=473074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/473074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/473075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=473074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=473074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=473074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}