United States: Doctors in Rhode Island are seeing or facing more people with symptoms like coughs, sneezes, runny noses, sore throats, and sinus infections.
As this flu season is on the edge and the holidays approach, more people might get sick. However, doctors say there are things you can do to stay healthy and help keep others safe from colds, the flu, and COVID-19.
‘We are definitely getting a little bit of an increase in respiratory illnesses,’ said Dr Olivier Gherardi, medical director for Brown University Health Urgent Care with four centres in Rhode Island. Gherardi said that doctors have been attending to many patients with colds, but with strep throat as well.
As reported by providencejournal.com, Krusz, the family physician at CLW Medical Clinic, said she is treating ‘a lot of colds’ and is witnessing an emergence of the flu in the past few weeks.
She saw a lot of COVID cases in September, but now she said; _ It’s leveled off for the moment. In particular, Krusz works at the Warwick office of South County Medical Group Primary Care. She also serves as a medical director of The Cedars which is a nursing home in Cranston.
Increased flu activity in RI
“Yes, we are in respiratory virus season now,” said Joseph Wendelken, public information officer for the Rhode Island Department of Health. The metrics currently being reported by the health department tell a very simple story; the common cold viruses are again on the prowl. We have also begun to witness some level of flu activity rise in the state of Rhode Island.”
It gets worse as the weather chills, more so as the human beings are forced to spend most of their time indoors this holiday seasons. Gherardi attributes the increase in the number of cases to the time when schools were reopening after the holiday. He says it could be worse if it was not for this early warm weather.
Celebrate at home and be aware most illnesses that spread particularly during the holiday periods can be deadly.
Flu season, pointed out the researcher, generally starts up in December, with the period in between Thanksgiving holiday and Christmas being the most active. He doesn’t come across many COVIDs at the moment but says it could increase.
‘We know everyone is going to get sick from a cold roughly once a year,’ Wendelken said, but Gherardi Krusz and all of them clarified that people can do certain things to ensure their immune system is prepared for a sickness. It is also necessary not to transmit diseases, as some infections such as the flu, RSV or Covid can be dangerous for everyone but especially for some people.