More than 900 Californians — including 15 children — have succumbed to the flu this season in what has turned out to be one of the worst surges of the respiratory illness in years, according to a report released Friday by the California Department of Public Health.
Most of the influenza victims — 701 — were over 64 years old, which tracks with the conventional notion that the illness disproportionately affects older people.
However, the number of children who have died has raised concerns. Four more kids died from the flu during the week ending Feb. 15, increasing the seasonal pediatric death toll by more than a third, according to the report.
With regard to COVID-19, “we just thought about older adults as getting sick,” said Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease specialist and professor of medicine at UC San Francisco. “We have to reset with flu. Because with flu, it’s not just the very old, it’s also the very young. And they can do very poorly.”
The 15 children who died from the flu this season includes four teenagers from San Diego. None of the teens — aged 14, 15, 16 and 17 — had received flu shots, according to health officials.
“These recent flu deaths among our youth are tragic and concerning as we head into what historically is the peak of flu season,” Dr. Ankita Kadakia, San Diego County’s interim public health officer, said in a statement this month.
Vaccination rates have declined, particularly among children, for the flu and other ailments, according to Chin-Hong.
Nationally, roughly 58% of children between 6 months and 17 were vaccinated against the flu during the 2020-21 season, declining to about 45% as of late January of this year.
“In the world of vaccines, that’s like falling off a cliff,” Chin-Hong said.
The trend is similar in California: 47.7% of California’s children have been vaccinated against flu as of late January, the lowest since at least the 2019-20 flu season. Last year at this time, 53.7% of children were vaccinated against flu.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends everyone 6 months or older get a flu shot — ideally by the end of October to boost protection against the disease during high-circulation winter months.
The two types of flu generally circulating now are H1N1 — related to the swine flu strain that caused a flu pandemic in 2009 and 2010 — and H3N2, which “is notorious for just causing more serious illness in general,” Chin-Hong said previously.
Given how potent this flu season has already proved to be, officials say those who have yet to be vaccinated should consider doing so.
While flu activity remains high, it may be decreasing. California public health officials’ recent report shows a 3.4% decline in the rate at which flu tests returned positive results at the state’s clinical sentinel labs for the week ending Feb. 15, the most recent for which complete data are available.
Still, the test positivity rate sits at an elevated 23.3%. COVID-19 and RSV activity is low, health officials said, with positivity rates of 2.3% and 5%, respectively.
Chin-Hong said it’s not yet clear if the downward trend will hold.
“I think it’s too early to celebrate,” he said, adding that more data points are needed.
Flu season in the U.S. typically peaks between December and February, though the virus spreads year-round, according to the CDC.
Even if it’s on the decline, the virus is known for having a prolonged season, Chin-Hong said. It can run through April and sometimes later in the year.
“It’s not only the peak that we’re worried about,” Chin-Hong said. “It’s also the breadth of what’s happening this year.”
There were about 500 deaths last season from the flu by this point in time, and 600 the year before, the Mercury News reported.
Chin-Hong estimates he hasn’t seen a death toll like that of this season in a decade.
Times staff writer Rong-Gong Lin II contributed to this report.
