Everyone's sick this winter. What's up with flu, norovirus, RSV and COVID?
Experts say this is the worst flu season in the U.S. in more than a decade and cases are still trending up. Flu infections have reached the highest level since the winter of 2010 and 2011 when the swine flu swept across the nation, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows.
The surge in flu cases also comes amid concerns about high infection rates for other viruses including RSV, COVID-19 and the gastrointestinal bug norovirus. Still, health officials say flu cases are among their top concerns right now.
For the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic began five years ago, flu-related deaths topped COVID-19-related ones this winter.
Those numbers reflect just how intense this year's influenza season has been, said Jen Brull, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians.
'It's not that COVID-19 is getting better, it's that influenza is getting worse,' Brull said. "It sounds like, 'Oh, good, COVID deaths are going down,' but really it's just influenza illness and deaths are going up."
The CDC estimates that there have been at least 29 million flu infections so far this season, through Feb. 8, including 370,000 hospitalizations and 16,000 deaths.
While some years the flu disproportionately affects people of certain age groups, the agency described this year as a high severity season for people of all ages. For instance, the number of people who have so far visited the doctor for flu-like symptoms in February has spiked higher than during the same timeframe in 2020 at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
And last year, the CDC estimated that the flu caused a total of 470,000 hospitalizations and 28,000 deaths.
Brull, who also works as a family physician in Colorado, said flu cases typically swell in February just when it seems like the winter virus season is ending.
This year's surge in infections and hospitalizations appears larger than in the past, suggesting that this strain of influenza virus is 'more contagious' and 'more severe' than in past years, she said. If cases remain high throughout February, as they are expected to, Brull told USA TODAY flu deaths could triple from last year.
The severity of this year's flu season is driven by a combination of factors, experts suggested.
Daniel Griffin, an infectious disease specialist at Columbia University, said the uptick could be a result of people socializing more this year than they did in the immediate years after the pandemic.
Vaccination rates might also be playing a role, Brull said.
Flu vaccination rates among the general population are at their lowest level in three years, according to CDC data. Among children, they're at a six-year low.
'Any family physician would tell you it is not too late to get your flu shot or your COVID booster this year,' Brull said. 'Flu and COVID exist all year round.'
This year's cold and flu season has also seen spikes in other illnesses, including COVID-19, RSV and the gastrointestinal-related norovirus.
There were more norovirus cases between November and January of this year than at any point going back to at least 2012, according to CDC data. Infections related to that virus appear to be on the decline for this season.
The number of people heading to the emergency room for RSV and COVID-19 infections also is decreasing across much of the country, though wastewater data collected by the CDC suggests that COVID-19 infections are still high.
Griffin said the flu is 'the most common' illness infectious disease consultants are being called for in hospitals right now.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Flu cases are surging. How infection rates compare to the past.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Verge
33 minutes ago
- The Verge
RFK Jr.'s plan to put ‘AI' in everything is a disaster
In a 92-minute interview with Tucker Carlson on Monday, RFK Jr. drilled down on his vision for the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Artificial intelligence — arguably, a uselessly vague umbrella term — came up multiple times. (As did conspiracy theories and disinformation on vaccines and autism, the medical establishment, and covid-19 deaths.) As the head of HHS, Kennedy said his federal department is undergoing an 'AI revolution.' He implored viewers to 'stop trusting the experts,' as highlighted by Gizmodo, and, presumably, put their trust into AI instead of decades of scientific consensus. He referenced that AI tools were being used to 'detect waste, abuse, and fraud' across the federal government — the tagline for Elon Musk's misguided and disastrous DOGE initiative that's already led to a scramble to rehire hundreds of wrongfully cut CDC employees. Kennedy also vaguely declared that the CDC will be using AI to 'look at the mega data that we have and be able to make really good decisions about interventions,' demonstrating how flimsy his grasp of AI is. Kennedy said that AI will rapidly accelerate the drug approval process at the FDA, implying it will fully replace animal testing. This is not entirely new, echoing an April announcement from Kennedy's Food and Drug Administration that the agency will be phasing out animal testing for some pharmaceuticals in favor of 'AI-based computational models' and other countries' safety data. That agency-level change followed the 2022 passage the FDA Modernization Act 2.0 under President Joe Biden, which repealed requirements for all new drugs to undergo animal testing. There is a lot of ongoing research into the potential for alternate approaches like organ-on-chip systems, organoid cultures, and AI models to supplement or reduce the amount of animal testing used in drug development. And computer modeling has long been a part of pharmaceutical evaluation. However, it's likely premature to claim that AI can wholly eliminate the need for animal models. 'There is currently no full replacement for animal models in biomedical research and drug development,' wrote the National Association for Biomedical Research in an April statement. Even more concerning were Kennedy's hints that the current Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), which is overseen by the CDC, is set to be overhauled and outfitted with AI. (He previously suggested automating the system in April.) VAERS is a first-line detection system for catching rare, previously undetected risks associated with vaccines that has often been misrepresented by anti-vaccine advocates. AI drug testing may sound unsettling, but it would be conducted by external researchers and drug makers. Pharmaceutical companies are incentivized to not release dangerous products because they lose money when they harm people; Kennedy wouldn't be so directly held to account. Misinterpretation of VAERS data at the institutional level could sow further distrust in public health and give Kennedy's newly appointed vaccine advisory committee ammunition to change vaccine recommendations, legitimize their fringe beliefs, and limit vaccine access. Anyone can report to VAERS (and certain providers are required to report) anytime a person experiences any negative health event in the aftermath of a vaccination. A report to VAERS does not indicate causality. 'There's nothing about VAERS that allows us to determine whether a vaccine caused the reported adverse event,' says Kawsar Talaat, an infectious disease physician and vaccine safety researcher at Johns Hopkins University. 'People report things like anger after vaccination,' she says, for which there's no biologically plausible mechanism relating back to immunization. Even more serious events, like death following a vaccination, overwhelmingly bear out to be unrelated to the shot itself. 'The thing about vaccines is they protect against preventable diseases, not everything else that occurs in life,' says Paul Offit, a vaccine scientist, virologist, and professor of pediatrics at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. Yet even so, VAERS reports are followed up with CDC investigation through complementary programs like Vaccine Safety Datalink and the Clinical Immunization Safety Assessment Project. The system has worked since its establishment in 1986 to generate hypotheses for potential vaccine side effects and even to detect very rare vaccine risks. For instance, VAERS did successfully pick up the myocarditis associated with mRNA covid-19 vaccines, which only showed up in about one per 30,000 doses, and the blood clotting associated with the Johnson & Johnson covid-19 shot, which affected about one in 250,000 people, Offit notes. 'You're not going to pick that up pre-licensure, so I think VAERS works well,' he says. 'The problem is that anti-vaccine activists use it to mean that anything reported in that system is a real issue, which is obviously wrong,' he adds — echoing Talaat's point that anyone can report anything. It's not clear how Kennedy plans to introduce AI into VAERS, but presumably he means to feed VAERS data into some sort of automated system for identifying alleged vaccine side effects and risks. Earlier this year, the top US vaccine regulator at the FDA was forced out over his refusal to grant Kennedy unfettered access to the VAERS database, out of fears he and his appointees would manipulate the data. Now, with little standing in his way, Kennedy seems poised to do just that. There is a reasonable argument to be made that the right set of machine learning algorithms or AI tools could streamline the review process for VAERS claims. But AI systems are only as good as their training and parameters. If you feed them faulty information, that's what they're going to regurgitate. If you build an AI system to validate your preexisting belief that vaccines are dangerous, that's exactly what it will do. Despite the genuine promise that some AI approaches have in health policy and medicine, experts routinely emphasize that we need to tread carefully in building, vetting, and adopting these technologies. Bias, privacy concerns, legal challenges, and user manipulation all remain major issues, according to one 2024 review of 120 studies of generative AI in medicine. (Not to mention hallucinations: In May, the 'Make America Healthy Again Commission,' a presidential advisory committee chaired by Kennedy, released a likely AI-generated report containing false citations to studies that did not exist.) The key question here is if an AI vaccine risk-assessment system could be developed fairly and accurately under Kennedy's leadership. Offit, at least, doesn't think so. 'Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is an anti-vaccine activist, a science denialist, and a conspiracy theorist,' he says. 'He will do everything he can, as long as he is in this position, to make vaccines less available, less affordable, and more feared.'
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Vaccine Shortages. Viral Outbreaks. Widespread Illness. More Death.
It's September 2026. Routine childhood vaccines are now optional in the United States, and government officials, after hastily compiling an immense research registry of autistic people, have added the neurodevelopmental condition to the list of compensable vaccine injuries, thereby opening up vaccine makers to an onslaught of lawsuits. Facing decreased demand and increased litigation, some vaccine makers have pulled their shots from the domestic market entirely. Outbreaks are spreading across the country, sickening tens of thousands of people; too many are dying, especially children, pregnant people, and older adults. Something similar is unfolding around the world because the U.S. government ended vaccinations for millions globally. This is one scenario America faces if we continue down the path being bushwhacked by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and other anti-vaccine activists at the Department of Health and Human Services. And when I called up vaccine experts to ask whether my dystopian fears made me a doomer, they agreed that this grim scenario was plausible—and that it could get even worse. Every day seems to bring more ominous news about Kennedy's war on vaccines. Within just the past few weeks, Kennedy has done the following: He abruptly fired all 17 members of the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, known as ACIP, and replaced them with largely inexperienced people, some of who are outright anti-vaccine activists—who then promptly voted to ban thimerosal, a rare but safe preservative, from flu vaccines. He changed CDC recommendations so that they no longer say healthy children and pregnant people should receive Covid-19 vaccines. And he announced the U.S. would stop funding Gavi, an international organization that vaccinates children around the world. 'It's hard to know how this is all going to play out. But right now, everything appears very dark,' said Peter Hotez, dean for the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. And yet, he added, 'I don't think we've hit bottom. I think he's continuing to chip away, with some pretty big chips, to erode our vaccine ecosystem. I don't see a turnaround at this point. We're still in free fall as far as I'm concerned.'I'm not the first to try to gaze into a crystal ball about the future of vaccines in America. In January 2025, at Kennedy's confirmation hearing, Senator Elizabeth Warren began rattling off the actions he could take as secretary, given his history of profiting from lawsuits against vaccine makers: You could publish your anti-vaccine conspiracies, but this time on U.S. government letterhead, something a jury might be impressed by. You could appoint people to the CDC vaccine panel who share your anti-vax views and let them do your dirty work. You could tell the CDC vaccine panel to remove a particular vaccine from the vaccine schedule. You could remove vaccines from special compensation programs, which would open up manufacturers to mass torts. You could make more injuries eligible for compensation, even if there is no causal evidence. You could change vaccine court processes to make it easier to bring junk lawsuits. You could turn over FDA data to your friends at the law firm, and they could use it however it benefited them. You could change vaccine labeling, you could change vaccine information rules, you could change which claims are compensated in the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. The bottom line, Warren added: 'Kennedy can kill off access to vaccines and make millions of dollars while he does it. Kids might die. But Robert Kennedy can keep cashing in.' Sure enough, some of this has come to pass. In an X video in May, Kennedy announced that the CDC was changing its recommendations for the Covid vaccine. The agency turned the childhood recommendation from 'should' to 'may' and called the process 'shared clinical decision-making,' while eliminating the recommendation entirely for pregnant people, who are at significantly higher risk for severe illness and death. I asked the experts: Could other vaccine recommendations be softened like this? 'I think it's a real possibility—I think in many ways it's a goal,' said Paul Offit, professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. Project 2025, the right-wing blueprint for the second Trump administration, specifically called for eliminating the CDC as a recommending body. If a vaccine is no longer recommended, 'that means that it couldn't be required for school entry.' (School mandates have long been a target of anti-vaccine activists.) Others thought it might be even worse. '[Kennedy's] end goal is to remove most or all childhood vaccines—to make them inaccessible, is my view,' said Dorit Reiss, professor at UC Hastings College of Law. 'So your scenario is plausible, although you're being very cautious in saying they might move to shared clinical decision-making. They could say 'this is no longer recommended.'' The new ACIP advisers could stop recommending some vaccines entirely: HPV, influenza, and hepatitis B shots have all been targeted by anti-vaccine activists. They could also vote to end Vaccines for Children, a $5 billion program covering the vaccinations of nearly half of all children in the United States. The administration may also make it difficult to approve new vaccines. 'It's not only about Kennedy's insistence on saline placebos,' Hotez said, referring to the health secretary's announcement in May that vaccines would need to go through new, unethical clinical trials involving placebo tests. 'There's so little vaccine expertise now, either at FDA because people seem to be leaving, and with ACIP, there's almost no vaccine expertise in its current group.' And, of course, there's the harm that figures like Kennedy do with public advocacy against vaccines. That includes the ACIP advisers' recommendation on Thursday to remove thimerosal, a preservative used only in multidose vials of flu vaccines—about 4 percent of all flu vaccines given in the U.S.—in order to prevent bacterial and fungal infections. Thimerosal was removed from all other childhood vaccines in 2001 as a precaution when anti-vaccine activists first began linking it to autism—a connection that multiple studies have disproven. Banning it entirely now could undermine American's sense of vaccines' safety and June, Health and Human Services awarded $150,000 to the Arizona law firm Brueckner Spitler Shelts for its legal 'expertise' on the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, which is run by the Health Resources and Services Administration, a subagency of HHS. Drew Downing, a lawyer at the firm, has a reputation for representing people who say they've been injured by vaccines, and he has been involved in lawsuits against vaccine makers. Several of the new advisers on ACIP have also served as expert witnesses in lawsuits against pharmaceutical companies. 'I think [Kennedy's] goal is to either remove vaccines from the vaccine injury compensation program or add to the list of compensable injuries, all of which will weaken the vaccine infrastructure,' Offit said. Autism, for example, could be added to the list of injuries based on the administration's fast-tracked research to find a link between the condition and vaccines, despite decades of scientific research showing otherwise. Changes to the compensation program could mean vaccine makers simply choose to stop making shots available in the U.S., Offit said: 'Make vaccines expensive enough, or make them more subject to frivolous litigation, and they'll leave.' Something similar has happened before. In 1980, 18 companies made vaccines; by 1990, that number had fallen to four. A 1981 study suggested that the whole-cell pertussis component of the DTP vaccine could in rare cases cause permanent brain swelling. Subsequent studies found no such link; in fact, the swelling was caused by infant epilepsy. Even so, litigation against pertussis vaccine makers and then manufacturers of all vaccines began to mount, causing vaccine prices to skyrocket and pushing some manufacturers out of business. Faced with a volatile vaccine market, Congress passed a law in 1986 leading to the creation of the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. 'If you really want to hurt vaccines, mess with the vaccination compensation program,' Offit said. After all, vaccines aren't usually a big payday for pharmaceutical companies, he said. 'They make money on things that you give frequently. They don't make as much money as things that you give once or a few times in a lifetime.' The vaccine market is big, but for pharmaceutical companies, 'vaccines are still a very modest component of their revenue compared to all the small molecule drugs that they're producing,' said Hotez. Facing litigation, companies might decide vaccine production isn't worth it. 'If it becomes untenable for them to remain in the U.S. market, they may just pull the plug on their vaccine side altogether.'If the measles vaccination rate declines by 10 percent, 11.1 million people will contract measles within 25 years, according to a new study coauthored by Hotez. Other vaccine-preventable diseases would also come roaring back. The resulting illnesses and deaths would be 'absolutely devastating,' he said. But this isn't just a future fear. Outbreaks are already cropping up: 2025 has already been one of the worst years for measles in decades; whooping cough cases increased sixfold between 2023 and 2024; polio was detected in wastewater in 2022. 'Things are already starting to fray,' Hotez said. 'Measles is the first one you see break through, because it's so highly contagious, but the others will follow. I worry about pertussis. I worry about bringing back things like Hib meningitis, which I used to take care of as a pediatric resident. And I even worry about polio coming back.' But outbreaks tend to underline the importance of vaccines, increasing their importance among the public. 'As outbreaks grow, we will see people clamoring for vaccines. Remember that most people still vaccinate their children,' Reiss said. Most parents—91 percent—believe vaccines are safe for most children, according to a new poll from the opinion research program at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health. 'People want to vaccinate their children,' Offit said. He believes we won't reach a scenario where vaccination rates drop low enough for widespread outbreaks. 'We won't let it get that far,' he said. 'I have to believe the federal government will step in.' Hotez agreed: 'Ultimately it's going to come down to the White House.' After all, outbreaks wouldn't be seen as solely the fault of top officials like Kennedy, Reiss said: 'Outbreaks are not going to be limited to the 'Kennedy outbreaks' or the 'HHS outbreaks,' they're going to be the Trump outbreaks. So I don't know how much Trump is willing to give Kennedy leeway when polio or diphtheria starts coming back.' Regardless, much damage has already been done, and Kennedy has only been on the job for less than five months. 'It will take decades, not years, to fix the damage,' said Reiss. Kennedy and other officials 'essentially took a machete to our public health institutions, and fixing that and rebuilding trust is going to take a while.' Yet there are no signs the damage is ending or that reprieve is coming, she said. 'We're in trouble.'
Chicago Tribune
an hour ago
- Chicago Tribune
Daywatch: Once lost, Purple Heart is back with family of Peoria veteran
Good morning, Chicago. Nearly 81 years to the date after 20-year-old Army Pfc. John L. Moore was wounded while fighting to liberate Europe during WWII, the Purple Heart he earned that day is now in the hands of his only surviving sibling. Jerry Moore was little more than a toddler when his brother went off to war. Now 86, Moore held the heart-shaped medal for what he said was the first time after Illinois Treasurer Michael Frerichs presented it to him yesterday at the World War II memorial in Decatur. The poignant ceremony, which included the Macon County Honor Guard, was held just days before the Independence Day holiday weekend. 'It means a lot to my heart,' said Jerry Moore, fighting back tears. 'I don't think there can be any higher honor than getting this back.' Read the full story from the Tribune's Christy Gutowski. Here are the top stories you need to know to start your day, including a look back at a suburban company's role in the creation of DeLorean time machine, why Cook County political leaders are pointing fingers over tech troubles and which Chicago players were named All-Star Game starters. Today's eNewspaper edition | Subscribe to more newsletters | Asking Eric | Horoscopes | Puzzles & Games | Today in History A drive-by mass shooting killed four people and wounded 14 more late last night on the near North Side, Chicago police said. The shooting took place around 11 p.m. yesterday and little detail was available this morning. A large group of people were on the 300 block of West Chicago Avenue when people inside a dark vehicle drove past, fired into the crowd and drove away, police said. The government's top vaccine official working under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recently restricted the approval of two COVID-19 vaccines, disregarding recommendations from government scientists, according to federal documents released yesterday. The new memos from the Food and Drug Administration show how the agency's vaccine chief, Dr. Vinay Prasad, personally intervened to place restrictions on COVID shots from vaccine makers Novavax and Moderna. The Chicago versus downstate dynamic has been a source of friction in state politics for years, and Gov. JB Pritzker's choice figures to play into that issue going forward. For his part, Christian Mitchell said he is ready to meet people from all over Illinois. On the 40th anniversary of the 'Back to the Future' movie premiere, Northbrook-based insurance giant Allstate is traveling back to the past to reveal its little-known role in developing the DeLorean, the futuristic but short-lived, gull-winged, stainless steel car that served as Doc Brown's time machine. Without Allstate, Marty McFly might never have left 1985 or perhaps he would have traveled back in time in a Buick, forever disrupting the space-time continuum of the seminal movie trilogy. Cook County property tax bills already on track to be at least one month tardy may arrive even later as controversial contractor Tyler Technologies' upgrades to the countywide property tax systems are again running behind schedule, leading to mounting frustration and political fighting among county leaders. Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle's office yesterday published the first of what is expected to be several reports detailing the technology delays and assigning blame for whether the fault lies with Tyler or with Assessor Fritz Kaegi, Treasurer Maria Pappas or Clerk Monica Gordon, the three county officeholders who handle property taxes. The family of slain Chicago police Officer Krystal Rivera is calling for city agencies to relinquish the investigation of her death and, instead, turn over the probe to the Illinois State Police as they pursue legal avenues. The slain officer's parents and their attorney also asked that the city release the body-worn camera footage that captured the fatal June 5 shooting — despite a standing order from a Cook County judge preventing the public release. A jury found a former Chicago Public Schools dean guilty of multiple felony counts for sexually abusing a student, after the young woman testified that he coerced her into a relationship years earlier while she attended a Little Village high school. For the first time in nearly 90 years, the Chicago Cubs will have two outfielders in the starting lineup at the All-Star Game. Center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong and right fielder Kyle Tucker earned enough votes in the second phase of the process, which ran from Monday until 11 a.m. yesterday, to be named National League starters for the Midsummer Classic on July 15 at Truist Park in Atlanta. Sean 'Diddy' Combs was convicted yesterday of prostitution-related offenses under the federal Mann Act, an anti-sex trafficking law with a controversial, century-old history. Here's what to know about the law. The longest, strangest trip embarked upon by a rock 'n' roll band ended 30 years ago this week at Soldier Field. On July 9, 1995, the Grateful Dead played what would be its final concert with its full lineup at the stadium — the harmonious echoes of 'Box of Rain' concluding a fascinating musical journey that began in May 1965 at a small pizza parlor in California and encompassed more than 2,300 shows. This will be a great big for many of you, particularly armchair architecture historians, professional historians and anyone who ever took an architecture boat tour and now has strong opinions about bricks — but Christopher Borrelli didn't really know why the Wrigley gave off such odd vibes until he read 'The Wrigley Building: The Making of an Icon,' a fascinating and pretty entertaining new $95 coffee table book devoted to this terra cotta mainstay.
