from typing import Counter


def get_mode(counter: Counter) -> int:
    """
    Helper function to return the count of the most common
    element from an instance of Counter()
    :param counter: collections.Counter instance
    """
    mode = counter.most_common(1)
    if not mode:
        return 0
    # if mode is not empty it will be a list containing a
    # single tuple from which we want the second element
    return mode[0][1]