Flu Symptoms

Flu: Introduction

Influenza the medical term for flu is a common infectious disease spread by RNA (ribonucleic acid) flu virus. It affects your respiratory tract and has potential for creating health complications.

A highly contagious type of disease, the flu virus spreads by entering your mouth or nose through coughs and sneezes of a flu infected person.

What are the different Flu Symptoms?

Initially, following an infection you may experience high body temperature. As the virus spreads through your body and the infection advances, your body starts to ache.

Even though flu signs and symptoms have known to weaken about seven days after infection, they can affect and linger for longer periods.

A flu infection may fade by itself even without medications. On the contrary, it can cause severe complications or prove fatal in infants and children, old people and in people with serious underlying health conditions.

Some common signs and symptoms for flu:

• Fever (high) and/or chills
• Cough
• Sore throat
• Running nose
• Headache
• Vomiting
• Body ache
• Fatigue
• Diarrhea

Signs and symptoms of flu usually display in between one to four days of an infection or they may appear all of a sudden.

You may experience signs of flu such as a sore throat or even rashes when the flu virus initially infects your respiratory tract. There are cases where people display no signs for flu in the initial days of an onset.

Although flu prevention methods (flu vaccination) have remained effective in curbing its spread, the disease keeps on surfacing in the form of seasonal epidemics in many regions around the world.

Timely medical attention can help stop further health deterioration (complications such as pneumonia) by limiting flu symptoms and rendering substantial relief.