influenza
How To Not Die of the Flu
Mallory Ortberg · 01/12/13 01:42PMYes, the flu season is really bad this year. No, it's not entirely due to "people use too much Purell nowadays" or whining about what's probably just a cold, either. The CDC reports that more than 200,000 people are hospitalized from "flu-related complications" every year. Sometimes, especially in the winter, people will use the word "flu" to describe any condition they want, but this is not the flu's fault and you should not blame it.
You Will Not Be Able to Escape the Worst Flu Season in 10 Years (Unless You Move to Connecticut)
Max Read · 01/09/13 06:48PMHow bad is this year's flu season? Here's a Google map that estimates how bad the flu is across the country based on aggregated Google search data. No matter where you live in the U.S., you're facing "intense" or "high" flu activity — unless you live in Connecticut, in which case you're only looking at "moderate" activity (but you're suffering enough).