I am so sorry to hear about your brother’s death. We had it last month, it lasted for almost 3 wks., then another couple of weeks just so weak we could hardly stand up.
It IS worse this winter, and I hadn’t had a case of the flu in over 30 years. - I AM convinced that washing the hands right after being out in public and before eating helps. I’d gotten sort of lax about that.
You’re right; with modern medicine, we do have it better than in generations past. My mother’s brother died of spinal meningitis early in the last century at age 5. (The irony of it is that they lived in a cabin just a few miles outside of town. There was no hospital or doctor for many miles around. My grandfather rode a mule all day to get to a doctor to come to the child. - Today, there’s a hospital in the little town; and a 911 call would bring an ambulance within 15 mins. and he’d have been at the hospital certainly within 30 mins.) So sad.
These old bones of ours have to go through a lot in this life.
I try to shop in stores that provide hand wipes to clean shopping cart handles and hands as we start throught the place...