NORTH CAROLINA — Flu cases have reached their highest level nationwide in 15 years. Health officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that seasonal flu activity remains elevated nationally.
But this season is now classified as a high-severity season overall and for all age groups, the first since 2017-2018.
“The peak seems to have been that first week in February. So hopefully we’re on our way back down. But we were up very high. So it’s going to be quite a while that we still have a lot of flu spreading,” said North Carolina Epidemiologist Zack Moore.
North Carolina tallied 246 deaths from the flu since October, two of those being children. Last week, 34 people died.
Moore says this is one reason doctors encourage the influenza vaccine.
“It can lead to more severe complications. And as we see every year, even deaths, the number of flu deaths we’ve seen so far isn’t really that abnormal. We had over 300 deaths reported last year. This has been a fairly severe season. And I expect that, unfortunately, we’ll continue to see more flu deaths before it’s all over,” Moore said.
U.S. health officials suggest that everyone 6 months and older get an annual flu vaccination. CDC reports say that about 44 percent of adults received flu shots for the last two winters.
But data shows child flu shots dropped this winter from 50 percent to about 45 percent. Overall, 43 states reported high or very high flu activity two weeks ago. The illness was most intense in the south, southwest, and western states.
“Flu epidemics have really been picking up again recently. We had seen an earlier time frame than usual since the covid pandemic, but this season seems like it’s more back to our typical time for the peak of flu activity,” Moore said.
