Flu Season Hits Hard: What You Need to Know

The flu is spreading fast across the United States. Recent data shows that more people are visiting doctors with flu-like symptoms than ever before. This is the highest rate recorded since 1997. Flu-like symptoms include fever, cough, and sore throat. Most of these visits are from kids and young adults. About 35% of the visits are from people under 24 years old. Children under 5 make up about 20% of these visits. Hospitals are seeing a lot of flu cases too. There have been around 120, 000 hospitalizations this season. That's nearly 50% more than the week before. Sadly, there have been about 11 million illnesses and 5, 000 deaths due to the flu so far. New York is one of the hardest-hit states. Health officials there reported the highest number of flu hospitalizations in a single week. They also saw a record-breaking number of flu cases in one week, with over 72, 000 infections.This year, a new flu strain called subclade K is causing most of the cases. This strain is a type of the H3N2 virus. It has been spreading since the summer in other countries like Canada, Japan, and the U. K. Experts say the flu season is not over yet. They expect more cases in the coming weeks. Other viruses like COVID-19 and RSV are also spreading, making things worse. The CDC recommends that everyone 6 months and older get a flu shot. The vaccine can prevent millions of illnesses and doctor visits. It is especially important for people at higher risk of serious problems. Despite the flu shot being widely available, not enough people are getting vaccinated. As of December 13, only about 42% of adults and kids have received the flu vaccine. This is concerning because last season, 289 children died from the flu, and nearly all were unvaccinated.