People who are saying "it isn't the flu", because it lasts a long time and leaves a lot of damage behind, have just never had a sufficiently bad flu.
In 1999, I was 35 years old, and in the late stages of training for a half marathon, in other words, young and in excellent shape. I got the seasonal flu that resulted in a SARS event (SARS is the thing that actually kills you, and ANY flu can turn into SARS) so severe that there were a few days where I was literally afraid to breath out, because I wasn't sure I could breathe back in again. The acute portion of the disease lasted about 3 weeks, and it took about a year before I felt reasonably normal again. I have scarring on my lungs from it that my doctor says is visible on an X-ray, but says it is relatively minimal given the severity of my disease.
This is why, if you are sick, the thing you need to do is STAY HOME. A regular seasonal flu can, and occasionally does, kill even young very healthy people. I was almost one of them.
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