NEW YORK (AP) – February is often the peak of the flu season, with doctors’ offices and hospitals crowded with suffering patients. But not this year.
The flu has virtually disappeared from the United States, with reports reaching much lower levels than anything seen in decades.
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Experts say the measures put in place to prevent the coronavirus – mask use, social distance and virtual schooling – were a big factor in preventing a “twindemia” of flu and COVID-19. An effort to vaccinate more people against the flu probably helped, as well as fewer people traveling, they say.
Flu-related hospitalizations, however, are a small fraction of where they would stay even during a very mild season, said Brammer, who oversees the CDC’s screening of the virus.
Influenza mortality data for the entire US population is difficult to compile quickly, but CDC officials maintain a continuous count of child deaths. A pediatric flu death has been reported so far this season, compared with 92 reported at the same point in last year’s flu season.
“Many parents will say that this year their children are as healthy as they ever were, because they are not swimming in the germ pool at school or daycare in the same way they were in previous years,” said Mick.
Some doctors say they have even stopped sending samples for testing because they don’t think the flu is present. However, many laboratories are using a “multiplex test” developed by the CDC that checks samples for both the coronavirus and the flu, Brammer said.
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More than 190 million doses of the flu vaccine have been distributed this season, but the number of infections is so low that it is difficult for the CDC to make its annual calculation of how well the vaccine is working, Brammer said. There is simply not enough data, she said.
This is also challenging next season’s flu vaccine planning. This work usually starts with checking which flu strains are circulating around the world and predicting which ones are likely to predominate in the coming year.
“But there are not many (flu) viruses to watch for,” said Brammer.