At some point every year someone will say to you, "It seems like everyone's sick, huh?" Except! Right now, everyone really is sick, aren't they? Walking around town is like the "before" part of a DayQuil commercial. Sniffling and sneezing and coughing and hacking. It's everywhere.
Words like epidemic tend to get tossed around willy nilly whenever flu seasons get nasty. But the CDC confirmed Friday that what the U.S. is going through right now officially qualifies as an epidemic.
The Centers for Disease Control is set to release its weekly flu advisory report on Friday, which will show that the nationwide flu epidemic continues to grow, even though it may have begun to peak in the states where it first began.
A summary of the best reads found behind the paywall of The New York Times.
Doctors say we're entering the worst flu season in a decade, Boston's mayor has declared a public health emergency, and Chicago hospitals are having to turn away sick people. So we should panic, right? Not yet, according to recent flu epidemics.
Flu season has hit hard particularly early and in a particularly nasty fashion this year, and now you can look at its path by way of Google searches.
Discovered: What a never-before-seen type of rock tells us about water on Mars; forecasting the flu based on weather; atoms get colder than absolute zero; you'll change more than you think.
Discovered: Wizard-like scientists make objects invisible; death is close when chromosome tips are worn down; pregnant women who contract flus are more likely to have autistic babies; prosthetic skin that heals itself.
A summary of the best reads found behind the paywall of The New York Times.
Discovered: A magical flu vaccine, there's no such thing as a healthy video game, a quantum microphone, nicotine mouth spray, your boyfriend may think you're fatter than you are.
Discovered: Best photo of the Earth, ever, what technology is doing to young girls, the super-flu isn't so super after-all, party hosts party hardest, eating marine mammals is a thing.
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