 The number of people hospitalized for the flu this year continues to be on the rise. A Sarah Winckelman heard from local physicians about how influenza is impacting the Brainerd Lakes area. Across the state of Minnesota, the flu virus is widespread and Brainerd is no exception. It has been a rough flu season. Ascension Health St. Joseph's Medical Center in Brainerd has seen hospitalization numbers increase dramatically from last year. We've had over 90 people hospitalized here at our Medical Center with influenza this year. At this time last year we had only had five or six and by the end of flu season last year had had just over 50. With the flu season that could possibly hit the peak in the near future. I think we won't really know that we've hit our peak until we're starting to hit that decline and we haven't seen that yet so at this point it's still it's still very prevalent within our community. Until then it's important to take prevention steps to stop the spread that often comes in the form of coughs and sneezes. And we don't think about those micro droplets the particles that are traveling and with a sneeze potentially 10 to 15 feet depending upon the amount of force that you have behind that. In order to stay healthy doctors recommend the easiest way it's to go to the sink and wash your hands for at least 30 seconds while singing your favorite song. These simple steps can help prevent a large-scale illness. It's feeling like you've been hit by a truck. Generally we do see high fevers so where we're talking about that 102 kind of fever we're talking about body aches we're talking about cough we're talking about chills we're talking about headache and just feeling miserable. With a number of contributing factors health officials say this season's flu strain is very strong. The extremely cold weather that we've had nationwide has also bred for a very strong strain and so that's part of why we're seeing it be so bad this year comparative to other years. And as for now there's no sign of slowing down. We've sort of had a steady stream of patients both in the inpatient and outpatient realms basically since the holidays. In order to stop the spread Ascension is reminding the public that it's still not too late to get a flu shot or start practicing good hand hygiene. Reporting in Brainerd Sarah Winkleman Lakeland News. For many the best treatment for the flu is ibuprofen or Tylenol and lots of fluids and rest. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.