First, you should know that influenza is a serious illness, not a bad cold. If someone says they missed work yesterday because they had “a touch of flu,” it was not influenza. We get upper respiratory illnesses from a myriad of viruses, and most are annoying but not serious.

            Influenza comes with a high fever, bad cough (including possible pneumonia), feeling too weak to do normal activities and the possibility of dying. In the U.S., depending on the influenza strain, between 20,000 and 60,000 adults die of influenza each year. Those at highest risk are the very old and the very young.

            Experts are expecting this to be a bad season since it was bad in the southern hemisphere during their May to September flu season, and that usually predicts what we will experience in our November to March season.

            Another troubling factor is that there is a new strain circulating, already causing the majority of influenza cases in Britain and Japan, which is not targeted in this year’s vaccines. The influenza virus constantly mutates, trying to evade our immune system.

            Until we switch to the “just-in-time” production of flu vaccines using mRNA technology, we are going to be using educated guesswork to decide what to put in the vaccines. Some years the experts guess right and other years, like this one, the virus fools us.

            So, what should you do?

            Number 1: get vaccinated! Even if the vaccine is not perfect, it will reduce your chances of getting influenza and it will markedly reduce your likelihood of being sick enough to be hospitalized or die. If you are over 65, get the high-dose vaccine.

            The national association of cardiologists recently emphasized that flu vaccines prevent hospitalizations and deaths in people with cardiovascular disease.

            Number 2: wear a mask when you are indoors in crowded places like theatres or Black Friday stores. Masks are not a panacea but do reduce transmission of respiratory viruses by about 25%.

            Number 3: if you are sick and coughing, stay home. Sharing your toys is good. Sharing your viruses is not.

            Don’t spoil the holiday season by catching or giving influenza.

            Edward Hoffer MD is Associate Professor of Medicine, part-time, at Harvard.

What Does The Doctor Say?

By Dr. Edward Hoffer

Author’s Note: I’m sharing this byline with my daughter who is home for the holiday. She offers a fresh view on Thanksgiving.

            I’ve spent the past four Thanksgivings abroad – having moved to London four years ago and Paris two years later. Outside the US, it feels like the harvest season is swiftly fast-tracked to winter wonderland ideations shortly after October. No, not a horn of plenty in sight. Instead, my previous Novembers have launched straight into the respective Anglo/Franco visions of the holiday season, from mince pies and Victorian carolers to vin chaud and Alsace.

            Abroad, Europeans can be chiding about Thanksgiving, seeing it as Americans having “another excuse to eat.” Or sometimes they will confuse it with the Super Bowl. I’ve been proposed makeshift Thanksgiving celebrations abroad by my various friends and family-in-law, though the plans gradually dissipate as logistics play in: Why would we organize a big dinner with Christmas just around the corner? Could we just do a chicken instead of a turkey? What the hell is stuffing?

            As an expat, I’ve realized that Thanksgiving is the one holiday I really have missed profoundly. It’s the essence of togetherness, whether that be family or friends, and refreshingly free of the commercial trappings and empty wallets bemoaning Christmas day. But aside from the sentimentality that you’d find in a John Candy monologue, Thanksgiving allows the harvest season to persevere just a little longer – a time that feels like it comes all but too quickly. After an inevitable Indian summer ripples into September, apple-picking to trick-or-treating elapses in a fortnight, and what lies beyond for most is the endless grip of the bare-treed and charcoal-skied winter.

            I arrived back home to Massachusetts yesterday – admiring  the enduring foliage and even smiling at the goofy inflatable lawn turkeys on my bleary-eyed jetlagged voyage from Logan airport to home. My mom had gracefully rotated the sinking jack-o-lanterned faces of pumpkins framing the front door to their last patch of robust orange real estate. Her window boxes flashing comforting shades of marigold and amber. Warty, warped gourds adorning tables inside. Autumn is indeed on its last legs, but what a delight to feel it still.

            Let me be transparent, Thanksgiving in our household is a far cry from stepping into a Norman Rockwell painting; the inevitable hosting stressors of cooking, cleaning, and universally pleasing a large gathering of individuals with varying tastes, mealtime preferences (and, as the wine flows, politics trickling into the table conversation), it’s not without its tensions. But as someone that’s missed out on this holiday for several years, I now cherish this last moment of the harvest season, autumnal warmth, and admiration of fall’s brief yet profound beauty. And I hope this serves as a reminder for you all to cherish it too.

            – Contributed by Olivia McLean

            Who doesn’t agree with that assessment of our great American holiday? Thanksgiving is about pulling out all the stops – we want to immerse ourselves in gastronomic pleasure, and the big meal hits all the zones of discovery – taste, touch, hearing, smelling and seeing.

            To this end we will fuss a bit more over the menu, the table and the other indulgences that conjure the big feast. It’s excessive I admit, but so is the mirth created in having everyone together. Imagine everyone across our nation enjoying their turkey and feeling the thanks in their hearts pretty much in unison. Yes, Thanksgiving is a delicious big deal steeped in tradition and memories in the making.

            For us, the beauty of Thanksgiving is having everyone together, and with the expansion of our family it’s a little daunting having to prepare two 25-pound birds – yet the tasks do get done! The beauty of it is beyond the preparation and the responsibilities… it is seeing everyone together having a good time, the newest of the guests being my daughter’s new husband who hails from France. In addition, we will have representatives not only from his native France, but also Poland, Nepal, Italy, and Americans including the American South… a veritable Thanksgiving League of Nations.

            We are fortunate here in Massachusetts to think back to those at the first feast of 1621. This too was no small event but lasted three days with 51 pilgrims and 90 Wampanoag Indians.

As with many of our guests, the Wampanoags contributed, bringing deer, goose, duck, turkey and assorted vegetables and wild fruit – only a slight contrast from our modern menu according to Edward Winslow’s letter found in “Mourt’s Relations: A Journal of the Pilgrims at Plymouth.”

            After harvesting and hunting – akin to our foraging at local supermarkets – they gathered together “…many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and others…”

            Today’s Thanksgiving is a mix of many things – the all-important trussed up bird and its complementary dishes; the tossing of the pigskin – whether hometown or NFL; the extravagances of the Macy’s Day parade; whatever happens to be your tradition… and the single most important feature: celebrating the true bounty of life and giving thanks.

            “Let gratitude be the pillow upon which you kneel to say your nightly prayer.” – Maya Angelou

The Seaside Gardener

By Olivia and Laura McLean