Viraldice: We’re Breaking Down How to Tell the Difference Between the Cold and the Flu This Season

few weeks ago, I had the flu.

Of course, I didn't know it was the flu at first – or rather, I didn't want to know it was the flu. After all, I'd been warned that this year's flu epidemic was one of the deadliest in recent history with young, healthy people dying of the virus, so I'd done my due diligence and taken my flu vaccine.

I was protected, I thought. Immune. I was also very, very wrong.

It started, as most of these things do, with an itchy throat and a fever. I didn’t think much of it – I was working from home that Sunday, so I just put on my fluffiest bathrobe and carried on as usual.

 

By Monday, I was hacking up bright green abominations, so I thought it was best to work from home, so as not to infect my coworkers with whatever outrage I had acquired. I also made a preemptive call to my sister, a real MD, and asked her what she thought I had.

She told me I had the flu.

 

“Try again,” I scoffed in the superior manner of someone who has taken the flu vaccine and is certain they’re immune.

She then advised me to go to the hospital, because you can’t diagnose people over the phone effectively.

To this suggestion, I turned up my nose. No way I was going to the hospital where there were real sick people with real illnesses like the flu. I decided the conversation with my sister was going nowhere, and diagnosed myself with strept throat. I’d had it before and the symptoms fit.

 

I had a fever, chills, raw throat, exhaustion and general malaise – yep, it was strept throat. Besides, I wasn’t sneezing or anything, so it couldn’t be the flu, right?

Wrong!