Huh. I don’t know if I’m picking up what they’re putting down here, but it kind of sounds like suppressing fever e.g. with Tylenol would actually be bad for (normal) flu progression.
Fever helps against all kinds of illnesses but it can also be deadly, so having fever reducting medicine around is a smart precaution IMO. If you're otherwise healthy and are dealing with a mild seasonal infection and have got something important going on, I can see why people would choose to reduce symptoms at the cost of taking longer to recover.<p>Lots of people go overboard with this, though, like taking flu reduction medicine with every single cold or using medication to go to work sick. American media seems especially accepting of people taking "flu medicine" over rest and recovery.
> <i>Lots of people go overboard with this, though, like taking flu reduction medicine with every single cold or using medication to go to work sick. American media seems especially accepting of people taking "flu medicine" over rest and recovery.</i><p>This is not specific to America; it's a thing in the entire Western world, and probably beyond. Because it's not like we have any other choice.<p>There is no slack in the system. Most people can't afford to have more than a few sick days in a year, and they prefer to save those up for when painkillers and cough medicine don't cut it anymore. Same with children, because a sick child staying home is usually equivalent to the parent taking a sick day themselves - either way, they're not at work.<p>We can talk about media or people going overboard once it becomes acceptable to skip work for a week because of sick kid, or in order to not get everyone in the office sick too.
>Most people can't afford to have more than a few sick days in a year<p>Sick days are unlimited in my country (and of course don’t count as vacation or similar).<p>I think this is relatively standard for European countries, though not 100% sure.
They may be on paper, but I can't imagine taking one every time you have a runny nose or a sore throat. Everyone from your employer to social insurance[0] will start looking at you funny. It's just unexpected, even though it's how you're supposed to be handling infectious diseases to prevent spread.<p>--<p>[0] - Or whoever is backing the free healthcare in your country.
But flu isn’t just a cold, it’s a serious disease. If they are sick to the point they have fever then they can’t really afford to not rest as it has a cost in the form of longer health debt. And even short term, by letting the fever run and resting and being 100% operational can be more productive than being a zombie on medications for weeks.
Not to mention it is an infectious disease that they will spread to other people if they go to work.
By the time they can tell it's "the flu" and not just "a cold", they've been infecting everyone for days already.<p>Not to mention, cold is an infectious disease too (it's <i>literally the same disease</i>, just a weaker variant caused by strains that evolved their potency away), it too will spread to other people if they go to work.
> Not to mention, cold is an infectious disease too (it's literally the same disease, just a weaker variant caused by strains that evolved their potency away)<p>“The cold” is actually any of a wide variety of different viral diseases (caused by various forms of rhinovirus, coronavirus [0], and, I think, a few other kinds of viruses), none of which are flu (influenza virus). It is not a less potent flu.<p>[0] so calling COVID-19 “a bad cold” is correct from a certain point of view, despite being substantively misleading.
Fair, I was under the impression that some strains of influenza viruses are in the mix too, but apparently they're distinct and not part of the cocktail (surprising, given how the other viruses found themselves bucketed like this - they evolved to lose potency over time; I'd expect influenza strains would be on the same trajectory).<p>Still, my main point holds - you usually can't tell by symptoms alone, whether it's a common cold or a flu. In case you get severe symptoms, by the time you can, you've already been infectious for some time. So either way, the right time to call in sick is <i>when you first notice the early symptoms</i> - stuffy/runny nose, cough, headache, elevated body temperature. But obviously <i>nobody does that</i>, because it would mean calling in sick at random a dozen or more times per year.<p>Post-lockdown COVID was the only time I know of in the last few decades, and a brief time indeed, when it was socially acceptable to react to potential symptoms at the right time.
Some people colloquially call a cold "the flu", but the common cold is very different to influenza. Please don't spread misinformation.
"Common cold" is what we call flu/COVID/bunch of other stuff when symptoms aren't severe enough to bother checking. There is no "cold virus", as cold isn't a specific sickness but a destination; it's a catch-all for respiratory pathogens that evolve their potency away.<p>By the time someone is able to tell they have "the flu", they should've been on a sick leave for 2-3 days already.
People mix common cold with flu all the time. If you have the flu you usually can't even go out of bed, even with medication.
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> Most people can't afford to have more than a few sick days in a year<p>I believe it's true in the USA, but not necessarily in Europe. It's quite normal that you have two infections a year, plus sometimes your kid catches something at a completely different time, so the law protects you in these situations.
Yes, but there's what the law says, and there's process, and there's expectations.<p>You can't just take a legal sick day each time you have a runny nose (good luck finding a doctor that fast), and even if you could, you'd quickly stand out. "Two infections a year" is an average for adults who power through remaining ones with painkillers and cough meds; if they didn't, we'd be talking 5+, probably closer to 10 if they have kindergarten-age kids.
It sounds like you just have a terrible employer. If I get the flu, I'm taking a few days off. If I feel poorly, I'm not working. Never been a problem with any employer. 5-10 sicks days a year is completely normal. You cannot be fired for this.
If you get the flu, and know it's a flu, you're a few days too late to take sick leave for it to be useful at preventing infecting your co-workers.<p>5-10 days of sick leave a year is perfectly normal, because that's how much people need to cover serious infections that cannot be easily powered through with meds.
Sounds like you have a pretty terrible employer. Of course there's an expectation that you're not taking sick leave for every minor cough or sniffle, but "powering through" infections is pretty absurd to expect from your employees.
> like taking flu reduction medicine with every single cold or using medication to go to work sick.<p>Basically how I grew up. I took painkillers and throat lozenges in my backpack to school.
Due to a condition I was born with, I was raised the opposite. No over the counter medication my entire life, with some exceptions. I usually decline pain management in ER, for things like broken bones, but for surgeries and stuff of course I have no choice as I go under.<p>I will take what the doctor orders though, to treat illness and conditions though thankfully at this stage there hasn't been many instances. Usually that's antibiotics.
Copying Google AI's response here as it's at least as good as what I was going to recall:<p>> Fever is a key part of the innate immune system, acting as a protective response to infection by raising the body's temperature. This increase in temperature inhibits the growth of many pathogens, enhances the activity of immune cells like leukocytes, and improves the effectiveness of the adaptive immune response.<p>My Vietnamese in-laws commonly make a sweat tent to shorten the duration of sickness. I can't say if it works, but it's something I intend to try next time I'm sick.
When I feel like I have a virus I usually put on my hoody which I only wear when I feel ill and a scarf and before going to bed I drink a lot of herb or ginger tea (like two cans)<p>this is will heat up your body and you get some night sweats, this usually helps reducing the sick time.<p>I can't say if it actually helps, but its become a ritual for that occasion
Well, yes?<p>Very simplified... It is a suppressor of symptoms like pain and fever which are the bodies way of letting you know something is damaged and killing off unknown foreign bodies respectively.<p>Suppressing symptoms does not remove the cause and is not a cure.
It is, as others have pointed out.<p>Although, we’re very unusual humans in the grand scheme of things. So using medication might be reasonable. The brain might start taking damage around 104F. That was probably a good tradeoff for a peasant farmer (our ancestors, on average). Most of us nowadays just think for a living, not such a good tradeoff for us. Take the fever suppressant, what’s the worst that’ll happen if you miss an extra day of work?
It's a fairly common notion to "sweat out" a flu. Stay in bed, wrap yourself up in lots of blankets and just sweat the damn thing out. High body heat kills the virus.<p>So it would make sense that drugs like tylenol/paracetamol would make you feel better, but would keep the flu alive in you for longer.
Anecdotally, I have used this technique many times, also drinking hot tea besides being wrapped in blankets, and at least for me it has worked much better than when taking any kind of antipyretics.<p>There are cases when the fever is dangerously high and antipyretics are necessary. But when the fever is supportable it certainly accelerates the healing.
Our pediatrician didn’t want us to give Tylenol unless the fever was over 99.5 and not to bring them in unless it was over 101 with Tylenol.
That's what we do here (Czech republic), we don't take meds until the fever goes over 39°C (above 40 you are looking for trouble). You lay in bed and drink enough to compensate for sweating. My grandma would make you onion tea.
Isn’t it common knowledge that adults heal quicker with higher fever, and that suppressing fever is needed only if it reaches dangerous levels (in contrast to children where fever can be dangerous at lower levels)?
This is common old wive's tale. Fever itself is not dangerous in adults or children.<p><a href="https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/127/3/e20103852/65016/Fever-and-Antipyretic-Use-in-Children" rel="nofollow">https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/127/3/e20103...</a><p>> There is no evidence that children with fever, as opposed to hyperthermia, are at increased risk of adverse outcomes such as brain damage.10,12,24–26 Fever is a common and normal physiologic response that results in an increase in the hypothalamic “set point” in response to endogenous and exogenous pyrogens.12,26 In contrast, hyperthermia is a rare and pathophysiologic response with failure of normal homeostasis (no change in the hypothalamic set point) that results in heat production that exceeds the capability to dissipate heat.12,26 Characteristics of hyperthermia include hot, dry skin and central nervous system dysfunction that results in delirium, convulsions, or coma.26 Hyperthermia should be addressed promptly, because at temperatures above 41°C to 42°C, adverse physiologic effects begin to occur.10,12,27 Studies of health care workers, including physicians, have revealed that most believe that the risk of heat-related adverse outcomes is increased with temperatures above 40°C (104°F), although this belief is not justified.7,26,28–30 A child with a temperature of 40°C (104°F) attributable to a simple febrile illness is quite different from a child with a temperature of 40°C (104°F) attributable to heat stroke.<p>You cannot get a dangerously high fever. You can get a dangerously high body temperature from heat stroke, or I suppose you could have some rare hypothalmic disease. But fever as an immune response is not dangerous to adults or children.
I know someone who doesn't get fever. When he gets sick with regular cold or fly it's much longer and worse than for anyone else I know.
Most people don't get a significant fever when infected with most common cold viruses.
You usually don't get a fever from a cold (except in Japanese anime), if there's a significant fever it's more likely to be a flu. Or, these days, could be Covid.
It may go further than that:<p>> Fever is used by organisms as diverse as fish, amphibians, reptiles and mammals (see for reference Basu and Srivastava, 2003). Since fever is metabolically expensive, it must provide substantial advantage to the host. Surprisingly little is known about immunological effects mediated by fever, a lack of understanding that might be attributable in part to the common ignorance in clinical practice with respect to benefits fever might provide. Post-operative infections can be prolong survival: patients developing empyema after lung cancer
surgery have improved 5-year survival (50% (n = 18) vs 22%
(n = 411)) (Ruckdeschel et al, 1972). In this light, it seems
unfortunate that fever is usually suppressed in hospital routine.<p>> The phenomenon of spontaneous regression and remission from cancer has been observed by many physicians and was described in hundreds of publications. However, suggestive clues on cause or trigger are sparse and not substantiated by much experimental evidence. [...] At least in a larger fraction of cases a hefty feverish infection is linked with spontaneous regression in time and is investigated as putative trigger.<p>> Professor Busch in 1868 introduced the infection of cancer patients by purpose as a novel strategy to treat cancer. He achieved a dramatic regression with his first patient using live Streptococcus pyogenes bacteria, the pathogen leading to erysipelas, published in the German Journal ‘Berliner Klinische Wochenschrift’ (Busch, 1868). Beginning in 1891, this strategy was exploited by Coley, who had some reading knowledge of German (Hall, 1998). Coley systematically applied Streptococcus pyogenes extracts – later called ‘Coley’s toxin’ – to cancer patients and achieved a remarkable rate of regressions. A retrospective compilation of cases considered inoperable at the time of treatment between 1891 and 1936, which was conducted by Wiemann and Starnes (1994, Table 2), determined a remission rate of 64% (108/170) and a 5-year survival rate of larger than 44%. Coley used to inject his extract once or twice a week over a period ranging from a few weeks to several months. His method became quite famous and was tested on hundreds of patients by him and contemporary physicians, but overshadowed by the development of X-ray treatment which was regarded to be much more powerful and of broader applicability.<p>> Since cancer is usually a slowly progressing disease with
occasionally long periods of dormancy, putative beneficial fever
effects should also precipitate as preventive efficacy. This can
indeed be found. In a cohort of 603 melanoma patients compared
to 627 population controls, an inverse correlation was found
between melanoma risk and number of recorded infections on the
one hand and between melanoma risk and fever height on the
other hand, leading to a combined reduction of melanoma risk of
about 40% for people with a history of three or more infections
with high fever above 38.51C (Koelmel et al, 1999). Mastrangelo
et al (1998) report a striking inverse correlation between the
number of infections and mortality from tumours in Italy in the
period 1890 –1960: every 2% reduction in the number of infectious diseases was followed by a 2% increase in tumours about 10 years
later.<p><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/6602386.pdf" rel="nofollow">https://www.nature.com/articles/6602386.pdf</a><p><a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16444847/" rel="nofollow">https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16444847/</a>
You want your immune system to simmer, not to boil.
kind of sounds like suppressing fever e.g. with Tylenol would actually be bad for (normal) flu progression.<p>you're just the tip of the iceberg my friend - did you know "horse dewormer" ivermectin has long been given to humans - for decades - to treat parasitic infections?