If you have been sidelined this fall with a sore throat that feels like you literally swallowed razor blades, you're not alone. Local physician Dr. Denis Fortier with Southern Health-Santé Sud says the rhinovirus is circulating in the region and it seems a very sore throat is a common symptom. The word 'rhino' is the Greek word for 'nose.'

Dr. Fortier is quick to point out this is not the flu or influenza, which usually rears its ugly head in December, January and February. Rather, this is a form of the common cold with increased number of cases ever since children returned to school in September. He notes it seems to be hopping from one community to the next and there have even been outbreaks in personal care homes.

"When it hits personal care homes we have pretty good policies and processes in place to sort of increase the awareness for staff and for people visiting," assures Dr. Fortier.

This includes reminding people of the importance of hand washing and even quarantining residents to their rooms to try and stop the spread.

According to Dr. Fortier, the common cold is a virus and a virus is not bacteria. That means a virus can not be treated with antibiotics as there is no known treatment for most viruses.

"It sort of has to run its course," explains Dr. Fortier. "Bacteria on the other hand are treatable with antibiotics in most cases."

Dr. Fortier says the common cold spreads almost universally by contact. That means if you touch your eye, nose or mouth after making contact with a doorknob, pencil or someone's hand, you are potentially inoculating yourself with a virus. Symptoms then include red eyes, runny nose or sore throat.

The other way the virus spreads is through droplets. And so, if somebody coughs or sneezes and you walk through that cloud of microscopic mist, you increase your chances of getting infected.

"Everyone should be in the habit of washing their hands frequently, especially during cold season or during flu season, that's the number one thing," says Dr. Fortier. "The number two thing is when you are coughing or sneezing remember what we said during the H1N1 epidemic and we continue to say this, cough into your elbow, into your sleeve, sneeze into your elbow, into your sleeve."

Dr. Fortier says every virus has its unique fingerprint. For some it is red, watery eyes, for other viruses it could be a runny nose or really bad sore throat.

"In this particular case we saw a lot of people describing exactly that, a very sore throat, razor blade kind of feeling," he says.

And Dr. Fortier says whenever patients complain of a very sore throat it always raises the concern that it could be strep throat. He stresses if the sore throat persists more than a few days or if there is an associated high fever or swollen lymph nodes or glands or if you see white stuff in the back of your throat these are indications that it could be more than a virus.

"But we have been swabbing a lot of people because of the intensity of the sore throat," says Dr. Fortier. "Most are still coming back negative for strep throat, which leads me to believe this particular virus probably the rhinovirus, that it's fingerprint in this particular case is a pretty bad sore throat."