By Greg Sullivan
Staff Writer

    Cases of the flu and flu symptoms have been prevalent in North Georgia in recent weeks and Madison hasn't been an exception to the trend.
    "It's been going on the last four weeks now," said local physician, Dr. Dan Zant of Madison Family Medicine.
    "About 50 percent of the people that have come in have shown flu symptoms," he estimated.
    Many of the other patients, Zant said, are coming in with colds or sinus trouble.
    Another local doctor, Dr. David Fletcher of  Madison Medical Associates said he has talked with Zant recently and the two have found that only about 30-40 percent of those with recent flu symptoms actually have the flu.
    "There's a really bad cold virus going around," Fletcher said. He said it mimicks the flu and usually comes with a lower grade fever.
    Fletcher said this doesn't mean the flu isn't still around.
    "It seems to be kind of dying down," Fletcher said of both the flu and flu symptom virus trend. "I think the peak was in January."
    In some of the more extreme local cases in recent months, Zant said he's had two patients hospitalized with the flu who had had the flu vaccine.
    "People have been getting the flu that have had the vaccine," Zant said, but he said he still recommends patients get the vaccine before flu seasons although it hasn't been 100 percent effective this year.
    Like Fletcher, Zant believes the recent flu and virus trend is dying down.
    "It's still around. We've seen less the last few days," Zant said.
    "I would say it's on the way out."
    "Hopefully," he said. "After the next two weeks or so it'll be done.