During the great holiday season, people can feel a mix of joy, excitement, and, sadly, sickness. The changing of seasons highlights the temperature change that everyone must deal with as it’s colder and darker. During this time, the rise of sickness is near, and many people fall victim to it every year. Everyone can experience the early symptoms, ranging from a slight headache to sneezing, but it eventually grows into a cold, or more prominently, the flu.

The flu, also known as influenza, was originally conceived from infections in animals like pigs and birds. Depending on the strand itself, the disease can transfer from human to human or even from animal to human. The consumption or beginning of the flu typically occurs within your respiratory nose cells. The takeover occurring within your nose is done by the specific molecule known as hemagglutinin, which can be related to strains of flu known as H1N1 and H3N2. The other molecule responsible for such corruption is neuraminidase. Such combinations of these molecules allow for different strains to occur, and the strains themselves are always changing, like many other viruses popular in our modern medical world. Now, with the Flu vaccine, the virus itself can be regulated and not spread as viciously in past epidemics; to date, the most recent one was in 2009.

It is extremely important to know when coming down with the flu, as it may be confused with other viral diseases. If anyone you know has symptoms like cough, dry throat, fever, etc., it is possible to consider that that person may be suffering from the flu. It is always better for you to protect yourself against such diseases to prevent such symptoms from occurring and save your body from as many infections as possible. This can be done by simply obtaining your annual flu shot. Will this stop the flu from entering your body at all? Will it 100% guarantee you do not get the flu? No, the vaccines developed protect people from the flu’s severe conditions and symptoms that may develop. The purpose of the vaccine is to help or aid your body when attacked by disease and deter any other weakening factors.