U.S. health officials say at least seven states are seeing high levels of the flu and that cases are rising in other parts of the country.

The U.S. flu season is underway, with at least seven states reporting high levels of illnesses and cases rising in other parts of the country, health officials say.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted new flu data on Friday, showing very high activity last week in Louisiana, and high activity in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, New Mexico and South Carolina. It was also high in the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, the U.S. territory where health officials declared an influenza epidemic earlier this month.

“We’re off to the races,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a Vanderbilt University infectious diseases expert

Traditionally, the winter flu season ramps up in December or January. But it took off in October last year, and is making a November entrance this year.

  • Melkath@kbin.social
    17·
    1 year ago

    This is why I still mask and social distance.

    That, and covid is still the number 1 killer of youth under the age of 18.

      • Melkath@kbin.social
        15·
        1 year ago

        https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2023-01-31-covid-19-leading-cause-death-children-and-young-people-us

        That is the most recent straight-from-source study I can find on the topic. Also published coincidentally right around the time governments started to refuse to collect data on Covid and declared Covid “over”.

        So, I’d say if we were still collecting the data, we may be able to see if the trajectory has changed, but we aren’t, so we cant.

        Also cant imagine that eliminating all Covid restrictions improved the figures.

        So, is it true? 100% a year ago. I am inclined to believe it is still true, but I cannot say “100% that is true today.”

        • grilledcheesecowboy@kbin.social
          8·
          1 year ago

          From the article:

          Among children and young people aged 0 – 19 years in the US, COVID-19 ranked eighth among all causes of death; fifth among all disease-related causes of death; and first in deaths caused by infectious or respiratory diseases.

          Unless I’m reading that wrong covid was never the leading cause of death for people under 18.

          • Seventhlevin@lemmy.world
            1·
            1 year ago

            Seems to be a thing that is ubiquitous here on lemmy. Someone posts a source that does not support their position, gets dozens of upvotes.

        • DrMango@lemmy.world
          5·
          1 year ago

          Among children and young people aged 0 – 19 years in the US, COVID-19 ranked eighth among all causes of death; fifth among all disease-related causes of death; and first in deaths caused by infectious or respiratory diseases.

          It was not even true a year ago, actually, unless you slice the data down to only look at deaths caused by infectious or respiratory diseases which, frankly, feels like a pretty obvious outcome for 2020-2022.