The number of states reporting widespread seasonal flu activity jumped from 10 to 25 last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday.
Widespread activity was reported in Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington state and Wyoming, according to the CDC’s weekly flu advisory report, covering the week ending December 28.
“Widespread” means that more than 50% of geographic regions in a state — counties, for example — are reporting flu activity. It addresses the spread of the flu, not its severity.
So far, “it’s a typical influenza season, if I can use that word,” Dr. Michael Jhung, a medical officer in the CDC’s flu division, told CNN last week.
The season usually begins in the winter months and peaks in January or February.
The only atypical thing seen this year is that the most common strain has been H1N1, which became known as swine flu during a 2009 outbreak.
“It’s the same virus that we saw in 2009 that caused the pandemic,” Jhung said. At the time, it was called swine flu since it was seen for the first time in humans.
But since then, “it’s established itself very nicely in the human population,” Jhung said. “We’ve seen it every season since 2009 in people.” The virus is no longer referred to as swine flu, but instead as a human seasonal virus.
The strain is so common that it was included in this year’s vaccination, he said.
