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NEW YORK – February is usually the peak of flu season, with doctors’ offices and hospitals filled with ailing patients. But not this year.
The flu has all but disappeared from the United States, with reports reaching levels far below anything seen in decades.
Experts say the measures put in place to fend off the coronavirus – mask wearing, social distancing and virtual schooling – have been an important factor in preventing a flu and COVID-19 ‘twindemic’. An effort to get more people vaccinated against the flu has probably helped too, as have fewer travelers, they say.
Another possible explanation: the coronavirus has mainly muscle the flu and other insects more common in autumn and winter. Scientists don’t fully understand the mechanism behind this, but it would be consistent with the patterns seen when certain strains of influenza predominate over others, said Dr. Arnold Monto, an influenza expert at the University of Michigan.
Nationally, “this is the lowest flu season we’ve ever seen,” according to a surveillance system roughly 25 years old, said Lynnette Brammer of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention .
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