Flu, Covid, RSV: why is Britain so very ill?

Two years of barely being exposed to such bugs seems to have disrupted their usual patterns

New Year's Eve gatherings, drinks with the neighbours: with zero restrictions on mixing, and almost three years of catching up to do, it's perhaps no surprise that many of us have been struck down with a mysterious lurgy that causes fever, sore throat, headache and other decidedly Covid-like symptoms - perhaps more than once.

But if you are consistently testing negative for Covid on a lateral flow test, what else could it be? And are we really more vulnerable to getting sick this winter, or have we just forgotten what life was like before Covid restrictions stopped the usual merry-go-round of seasonal infections?