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Dr Daniel Solomon wasn’t just afraid of a bad flu season. With the coronavirus still circulating, he was afraid of even a normal flu season.
“I was worried about overloading our hospital capacity,” he says. “Our intensive care units are operating on a narrow margin, and I was worried that if there was another flare-up of the flu, we just wouldn’t have the resources to care for the patients.
Solomon is an infectious disease physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he and his colleagues review flu numbers in weekly meetings.
“And we say, ‘Is there still influenza activity?’ And we always hear, week after week, ‘no’. So it was incredibly sweet, ”he says. “And there’s that sense of astonishment and relief that prevails about not being faced with a concomitant outbreak of flu and COVID.
In the fall, public health experts in Boston and elsewhere feared the prospect of such a “twindemic.” Now it’s increasingly clear that – thankfully – this was flu season that wasn’t.
Federal flu cards use a traffic light color scheme: green when the flu is weak, yellow when it is medium, and red when it is high. Here in Massachusetts and across the country the maps would normally show a lot of yellow and red in February. But this year, they are completely green.
And it’s not just the flu that’s weak. Dr Eileen Costello, chief of ambulatory pediatrics at Boston Medical Center, says it’s other viruses as well.
“We have seen a dramatic reduction in the rates of the flu this year and of the respiratory synctitial virus, which is a viral infection in infants and very young children that we see,” she says. “It’s the meat and potatoes of all pediatric practices in America, and we’re not seeing it at all this year.
Basically, “the flu season hasn’t started,” says Dr. Lynnette Brammer of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
She would know. She is the country’s leading flu tracker and says it’s the mildest season since the current tracking system started in 2009.
“I hate going out on my own, but this is my 30th flu season in the flu division. I think I can say for sure that this is definitely the lowest flu season I have ever seen, ”she said.
Many factors seem to be at work. “The mitigation measures put in place to try to slow the COVID pandemic are the most obvious: wear a mask, wash your hands, keep a distance,” says Brammer. “These things probably have a huge impact on the flu.”
In addition, a sharp drop in travel, especially international travel, and more people are getting the flu shot.
Brammer says a lot can be learned from this low flu season that could apply to more normal, non-pandemic times. Of course, no one wants pandemic-like restrictions every winter. “But it might be worth considering that during flu season, especially if it’s bad, you might want to consider using a mask, especially for those who are very vulnerable. will have a lot to think about. “
And many calculations to do.
“The problem, of course, is that there are tradeoffs,” says Daniel Solomon of Brigham and Women’s. “And the steps we took this year have just had incredible costs.”
They range from the toll isolation that has taken hold of many people, including the elderly and those living in long-term care facilities, and the loss of learning in schools.
Solomon predicts major efforts to analyze which tradeoffs make sense for a more normal year. He would like to see a nuanced approach to flu season – for example, wearing masks in crowded indoor environments, but not outdoors. He also hopes that flu shots will be needed for schoolchildren, as they were last year in Massachusetts, although the measure generated some controversy.
Normally, the flu kills tens of thousands of Americans each year, including dozens of children. Dr Jeb Teichman, of the nonprofit Families Fighting Flu, said that last season from the flu, 188 children died, the highest number the CDC has recorded.
This season is very different.
“It’s just amazing,” he says. “So far, until the fourth week, it’s at the end of January, a pediatric death.”
He says the record 192 million flu shots given this season corresponded well to the influenza strains circulating.
“And my crystal ball, which is really fuzzy, is going to tell me that with the way SARS-CoV-2 evolves and the variants that appear, we’re going to be getting a flu shot every year and a COVID booster.”
The flu season lasts until early spring, so experts say that while it looks like a banner year, it’s still too early to feel completely out of the woods.
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