How people die from the flu.
As white blood cells of various types hunt down the flu virus within your body, they bring inflammation along with them. due to these burgeoning of virus and WBC,Skin and VITAL organs swell a bit to accommodate all the new cells rushing in to try to repair your body. This isn’t a problem for small infections, but too much inflammation can be dangerous.
In the lungs, for example, swelling can prevent oxygen from reaching your blood vessels. Oxygen normally moves across very thin membranes in endless moist chambers inside the lobes(Alveoli) of your lungs. When that tissue becomes swollen with immune cells, it’s much harder for oxygen to reach the tiny blood vessels that it’s supposed to move into. There’s also some degree of damage to the lung tissue.
Viruses can’t replicate by themselves, so they have to do it inside your cells instead. That means that in order to kill the virus, your immune system has to destroy your body to some extent, which only makes oxygenation harder.
About a third of people who die from the flu do so directly. That is, they die from the effects of the virus (and the effects of their bodies trying to fight it off). Respiratory failure—when your lungs simply can’t get enough oxygen—is one of the most common ways. It’s also one of the fastest. Direct deaths from the flu occur quickly, often within a few days, and with little warning.
And that’s not the only way inflammation can get you.Having body-wide inflammation, otherwise known as sepsis.
“Multiple organ failure” is just as bad as it sounds. Just like inflammation in the lungs, your other organs can also develop severe swelling as your immune system sends cells out to kill the virus. A body-wide reaction like that triggers sepsis, which is when your immune system essentially reacts so strongly that the resulting inflammation overwhelms your organs. Multiple organs can shut downat once, and death is swift.
Even inflammation in individual organs can cause serious side effects.
The heart and brain are especially vulnerable to inflammation, since they have to function properly all the time in order for you to stay alive. They can’t tolerate damage the way kidneys or livers can. Brain inflammation quickly leads to death, and even if swelling in the heart doesn’t immediately cause death, it can trigger other, latent cardiac problems to flare up.
If you survive all that, there’s still one more danger left to go.
Acquiring a secondary infection, most likely pneumonia.
We all have bacteria inside our bodies, most of which do us no harm (and many of which do us a lot of good). That includes otherwise dangerous bacteria that exist in small quantities or are sequestered away such that they don’t hurt us.
But when your immune system is already flagging under the weight of a viral infection, those bacteria can spread to the lungs and take hold. This is called a secondary infection, and when it occurs in the lungs we call it pneumonia. Unlike a direct death, secondary pneumonia acts more slowly. Often you’ll start to feel better after a few days with the flu virus as your body starts to fight it more effectively. And then, suddenly, you’ll feel a lot worse. The bacteria have bided their time and are now multiplying rapidly inside your lungs, and your already exhausted immune system is struggling to keep up.
If you don’t report to a hospital when you start to take a downturn, you’ll likely die from the infection. Antibiotics can help if you catch it in time, but they’re no guarantee. Sometimes the bacteria have already spread so much that the antibiotics can’t kill them fast enough. And organ damage doesn't necessarily reverse as soon as you're being treated.
If you or someone you know has the flu—or just thinks they might have the flu—and you suspect they’re taking a turn for the worse, please go to the doctor. Influenza kills thousands of people in our country every year. Don’t wait until it’s too late.
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