Flu is rising nationwide, CDC reports, with spikes in ER visits

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released some new flu data to the public on Friday, despite the Trump administration’s halt of nearly all scientific communication coming from federal health agencies.

The information was not reported as it usually is by the CDC, in a weekly breakdown of flu activity called FluView, but was added to a section that focuses on respiratory illnesses in general.

Trends show flu activity remains high and is rising in many areas of the country, with increases in flu found in wastewater samples, the number of positive flu tests and flu-related visits to the emergency room.

As of the week ending on Jan. 18, the percentage of tests that came back positive for the flu was 25%, up from 19% the week before.

Emergency departments are also seeing an increasing number of people sick with flu, especially babies, older children and teens. Of overall visits to the ER, 5.2% were for the flu and were close to reaching the surge hospitals saw before the winter holidays.

Hospitals rely on the CDC’s weekly update to prepare for what’s coming their way, especially because flu is notoriously unpredictable.

“We look at data like this to see what additional resources we might need to bring in,” such as extra nurses or isolation beds, said Dr. Aaron Glatt, chief of infectious diseases at Mount Sinai South Nassau in New York. “It gives us a certain sense of what will happen.”

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The flu information released Friday did not provide the level of detail that’s normally found in its weekly FluView, such as specifics on flu strains and whether antiviral medications can still treat them.

And it didn’t provide an easy way to compare the rates of flu spread in different areas.

“Communicable diseases can suddenly spread quickly,” said Leighton Ku, director of the Center for Health Policy Research at George Washington University. “It can be a situation where the flu is slowing down in one jurisdiction while speeding up in another.”

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The FluView report also usually includes information on the spread of H5N1, or bird flu. In the absence of the report, the CDC opted to updated its page on the ongoing bird flu outbreak. No new human cases were reported, despite a rising number of wild birds sickened by the virus.

Dr. Robert Murphy, executive director of the Robert J. Havey Institute for Global Health at Northwestern University, said it’s crucial for the CDC and other federal health agencies to be free to report on the fast-moving bird flu outbreak.

“It’s changing literally by the hour,” he said. “Are we supposed to just forget about that?”

Department of Health and Human Services and CDC representatives did not answer direct questions about the availability of the weekly FluView, but repeated a previous statement in response:

“HHS has issued a pause on mass communications and public appearances that are not directly related to emergencies or critical to preserving health,” the statement read. “There are exceptions for announcements that HHS divisions believe are mission critical, but they will be made on a case-by-case basis.”

A memo sent to CDC staffers earlier this week suggested the pause would continue through Feb. 1.

The fact that the CDC didn’t release its usual flu report on Friday should not be a cause for major alarm, experts said. And it’s not unprecedented for the FluView to be delayed. It was previously released after its scheduled time because of the national day of mourning for former President Jimmy Carter.

“One piece of data in a huge data stream is probably not the end of the world,” Glatt said. “However, I am concerned if this continues. We do need to know, are we going up? Or are we going down?”