This winter has seen a significant drop in the severity of respiratory illnesses compared to previous years. While COVID cases have been milder, the flu season has taken an unexpected turn with a second peak emerging, raising concerns about the potential for dangerous mutations.
If you're enjoying this article, you'll love our daily newsletter, The LA Report. Each weekday, catch up on the 5 most pressing stories to start your morning in 3 minutes or less. This winter has seen a noticeable decrease in the severity of respiratory illnesses compared to previous years, with fewer people experiencing coughing, sneezing, and fevers. 'The current winter wave that we're kind of coming out right now does appear to be more mild than previous winters,' says Dr.
Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The weekly rate at which people are getting hospitalized for COVID this winter peaked at about 4 per 100,000, compared with about 8 per 100,000 last season, and about 11 per 100,000 in the 2022-2023 season.One possible explanation for the relatively mild COVID winter is that the U.S. experienced an unusually intense summer COVID wave that also started relatively late. As a result, many people may still have some immunity from when they had COVID during the summer. 'There are less people available to get infected because they had a recent boost in immunity,' says Dr. Henry Ford, an epidemiologist at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. At the same time, no new variant has evolved that's any better at getting around the immunity people have built up. Another factor that could be contributing to the lower rates of respiratory illnesses is viral interference. This phenomenon occurs when the presence of one virus pushes out other viruses. Some scientists think that may be one of the reasons for a decrease in infections with other respiratory viruses, such as flu and RSV, during the early, heavy COVID waves. 'It's possible that viral interference is playing a role this year,' says Dr. Ford. 'There's a lot of influenza circulating. It may generate some nonspecific immunity — some nonspecific protection, which then prevents people from getting other respiratory infections, such as SARS-CoV-2 — sort of crowds it out.' However, while this winter's COVID wave has been milder, influenza is causing problems. This year's flu season started unusually early and has been spreading at high levels around the country. And now, it looks like the U.S. is experiencing a second peak of flu activity this winter. 'Influenza activity first peaked around the turn of the new year — late December, early January. Activity then declined for several weeks in a row, which is usually a sign that the season is on its way out,' says Dr. Walensky. 'But then it really took an unusual turn and started to rise again. So activity is now at a second peak — just as high as it was at the turn of the new year. It's unusual.' The rate at which people were going to the doctor for a fever and cough or sore throat, which is one way the CDC tracks the flu, dropped from 6.8% to 5.4%, but then started to rise again, reaching 7%. So the intensity of this year's flu season could have a long tail, she says. 'This could turn out to be an unusually severe flu season,' Dr. Walensky says. The cause of the second peak remains unclear. So far testing hasn't spotted any signs that the H5N1 flu virus, which has been circulating among birds, has jumped to humans. So the cause remains a mystery, Dr. Walensky says. It could just be the kind of natural variation that happens with the flu. Still, the more people who catch the flu, the greater the chances that people could get infected with both viruses — the regular flu and bird flu. And that could give the bird flu the opportunity to swap genes with the regular flu and evolve into something more dangerous. 'That is certainly a huge concern,' says Dr. Ford. 'The danger with flu activity is that we have so many people that are infected with these seasonal viruses that it could increase the chance that you get a co-infection in a person with one of these seasonal viruses and H5N1, which gives the opportunity to generate a new virus that transmits really well from human to human. And that is one way you can get a pandemic.
COVID-19 Influenza Flu Season Respiratory Illnesses Viral Interference Public Health CDC H5N1
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