The first reason doctors think this could be a tough flu season for Americans has to do with what’s happening in other countries.

Australia is always where experts look first, because it has opposite seasons and the flu hits there first. Japan already declared a flu epidemic in October, and the United Kingdom is struggling too.

Some people in San Antonio can already relate.

Joe Soliz, a mariachi music teacher for San Antonio Independent School District’s Mark Twain Academy, has been teaching for 48 years. He hates having to miss school when he’s sick, but that’s exactly what he had to do early this week when he came down with a bad case of the flu.

“I got aches and pains, serious congestion, a cough that hurt my diaphragm,” Soliz said. “I was miserable Saturday and Sunday. I just could

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