Flu Season: How bad has it been?

By mid-January, the flu season had already made a name for itself as the most widespread on record since officials began keeping track 13 years ago, according to the Washington Post.

Flu had a vigorous early start in October 2017 and, by January 2018, officials did not believe it had peeked. About 9,000 people had been hospitalized with the flu during that period.

This year’s flu had already caused more deaths in children than was typical by July, with 10 child deaths by Jan. 13.

Part of the reason for the relative nastiness of the season is the star of the show: the H3N2 version of the virus.

Centers for Disease Control flu expert Daniel Jernigan said that this 50-year-old strain is quick to mutate to defeat the body’s immune system. “Of the viruses we hate, we hate H3N2 more than the other ones,” Jernigan said.

The CDC estimates that flu has resulted in between 9.2 million and 35.6 million illnesses and 12,000 to 56,000 deaths each year in the United States since 2010.

The season could last well past March 2018 and possibly later.