(SRN NEWS/AP) – The U.S. flu season is starting slowly, and it’s unclear if it will be as bad as last winter’s, but some health experts are worried as U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data posted Friday shows a new version of the virus has emerged.
An early analysis suggests current vaccines may still be somewhat effective against the new version of the flu, which has been the main driver of recent infections, CDC data shows.
Some scientists and medical professionals are more worried about disappointing vaccination rates, a main reason why flu hospitalizations and deaths were unusually bad during last year’s flu season — one of the deadliest this century.
“I think we’re going to see a really severe season,” said Asefeh Faraz Covelli of the George Washington University School of Nursing.
Last winter, the overall flu hospitalization rate was the highest seen since the H1N1 flu pandemic 15 years ago. Flu was the underlying or a contributing cause of more than 18,000 deaths, and one seven-day stretch early this year saw more than 1,800 deaths — the highest one-week spike in at least a decade. Child flu deaths also were far higher than usual.
CDC data posted Friday showed low flu activity so far, with only one state — Louisiana — reporting moderate activity. Most of the reported infections have been in children, said the CDC’s Alicia Budd, who tracks flu infections for the Atlanta-based agency.
Most also have been a new version of the type A H3N2 virus that historically has caused the most hospitalizations and deaths in older people. That type is responsible for most flu infections so far this year, and more than half have been a new subclade K variant that is different from the strain this year’s flu shots were built to fight.