2023-24 flu season becomes deadliest in six years for North Carolina: NCDHHS
RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) — When it comes to flu season, 2023-2024 has been a deadlier season than the past three seasons combined, according to summaries from the NCDHHS archive.
A total of 186 flu deaths were reported in 2019-2022 then the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 seasons saw historically low deaths while the country was masking up during the pandemic. Those years saw seven and 17 flu deaths, respectively, with zero pediatric deaths.
The 2023-2024 season has seen 281 total flu-related deaths so far, 14 of those pediatric, meaning in people under the age of 18.
There have not been more than 203 deaths in any of the past five seasons. But this year’s death toll is smaller than what the state saw six years ago, during the 2017-2018 season when a total of 391 deaths were reported.
The Good News: Trends are tapering
Fortunately, however, the latest batch of data from the NC Department of Health and Human Services this week told a similar tale to the prior seven weeks. The peak of hospital admissions and positive cases of the flu, COVID-19, RSV and other respiratory viruses appears to have come and gone in the state.
Following a downward trend, a brief plateau came along toward the end of January with most respiratory virus hospital visits continuing to lower. The one notable exception would be hospitalizations for COVID-19 symptoms, which saw an increase from mid-to-late February.
In just the past week, COVID admissions dropped from 809 to 664 — which is the lowest amount of admissions seen in a single week since Nov. 25, 2023, according to NCDHHS.
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