The burden of influenza in the United States can vary from year to year depending on which viruses are circulating, how many people receive an influenza vaccination, and how effective the vaccination is in that particular year. During the 2023-2024 flu season, around 28,000 people lost their lives to the disease. Although most people recover from influenza without needing medical care, the disease can be deadly among young children, the elderly, and those with weakened immune systems or chronic illnesses. Deaths due to influenza Even though most people recover from influenza without medical care, influenza and pneumonia can be deadly, especially for older people and those with certain preexisting conditions. Influenza is a common cause of pneumonia and although most cases of influenza do not develop into pneumonia, those that do are often more severe and more deadly. Deaths due to influenza are most common among the elderly, with a mortality rate of around 32 per 100,000 population during the 2023-2024 flu season. In comparison, the mortality rate for those aged 50 to 64 years was 9.1 per 100,000 population. Flu vaccinations The most effective way to prevent influenza is to receive an annual influenza vaccination. These vaccines have proven to be safe and are usually cheap and easily accessible. Nevertheless, every year a large share of the population in the United States still fails to get vaccinated against influenza. For example, in the 2022-2023 flu season, only 35 percent of those aged 18 to 49 years received a flu vaccination. Unsurprisingly, children and the elderly are the most likely to get vaccinated. It is estimated that during the 2022-2023 flu season, vaccinations prevented over 929 thousand influenza cases among children aged 6 months to 4 years.

During the 2023-2024 flu season in the United States, an estimated 27,965 people died from influenza. The vast majority of deaths due to influenza occur among the elderly, with those aged 65 years and older accounting for 19,038 deaths during the 2023-2024 flu season. During this time, the mortality rate from influenza among those aged 65 years and older was around 32 per 100,000 population, compared to a mortality rate of two per 100,000 population among those aged 18 to 49 years. Influenza deaths Although most people recover from influenza without the need of medical care, influenza and pneumonia are still major causes of death in the United States. Influenza is a common cause of pneumonia and cases in which influenza develops into pneumonia tend to be more severe and more deadly. However, the impact of influenza varies from year to year depending on which viruses are circulating. For example, during the 2017-2018 flu season around 52,000 people died due to influenza, whereas in 2023-2024 total deaths amounted to 28,000. Preventing death The most effective way to prevent influenza is to receive an annual influenza vaccination. These vaccines have proven to be safe and are usually cheap and easily accessible. Each year, flu vaccinations prevent thousands of influenza cases, hospitalizations and deaths. It was estimated that during the 2022-2023 flu season, vaccinations prevented the deaths of around 2,479 people aged 65 years and older.

Influenza, also called the flu, is one of the most infectious diseases worldwide. Its symptoms range from mild to severe, and include sore throat, cough, runny nose, fever, headache, and muscle pain, but can also cause severe illness and death among high-risk populations such as the elderly and children. During the 2023-2024 flu season, there were 40 million cases of influenza in the United States. Influenza deaths Although influenza does not require medical attention for most people, it can be deadly, and causes thousands of deaths every year. The impact of influenza varies from year to year. The number of influenza deaths during the 2023-2024 flu season was 27,965. The vast majority of deaths attributed to influenza during the 2023-2024 flu season occurred among those aged 65 years and older. Vaccination An annual influenza vaccination remains the most effective way of preventing influenza. During the 2022-2023 flu season, influenza vaccinations prevented an estimated 2,479 deaths among U.S. adults aged 65 years and older. Although, flu vaccinations are accessible and cheap, a large share of the United States population still fails to get vaccinated every year. In 2022-2023, only 35 percent of those aged 18 to 49 years received a flu vaccination, much lower compared to children and the elderly.

Weekly Cumulative Influenza Vaccination Coverage, by Flu Season and Race/Ethnicity, Medicare Fee-For-Service Beneficiaries aged ≥65 years, United States

• Influenza vaccination coverage among Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries aged ≥65 years is assessed using data files from the Medicare Fee-For-Service (FFS) administrative claims data managed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).

• Weekly influenza vaccination coverage estimates were calculated using Kaplan-Meier survival analysis, based on beneficiaries enrolled as of August 1, 2019 and followed through May 31, 2020 for 2019-20 flu season; and enrolled as of August 1, 2020 and followed through May 31, 2021 for 2020-21 flu season; and enrolled as of Aug 1, 2021 and followed through May 28, 2022 for the 2021-22 flu season.

• Additional information about data source is available https://www2.ccwdata.org/web/guest/home/.

This dataset includes weekly aggregate counts of persons hospitalized with laboratory-confirmed influenza (flu), by county beginning with the 2020-21 season. The primary goal of this dataset is to provide users timely information about influenza-associated hospitalizations throughout the current influenza season. Although each influenza season is unique, historical data is provided for trend comparison.

Between January and August 2020, there has been approximately 48.2 thousand deaths in England and Wales with COVID-19 as an underlying cause. As illustrated in the table, the number of deaths as a result of COVID-19 are much higher than from either pneumonia or influenza. There has been over three times the number of deaths from COVID-19 than pneumonia and influenza so far in 2020. The overall number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the UK can be found here. For further information about the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

Monthly Cumulative Number and Percent of Persons Who Received ≥1 Influenza Vaccination Doses, by Flu Season, Age Group, and Jurisdiction

• Influenza vaccination coverage for children and adults is assessed through U.S. jurisdictions’ Immunization Information Systems (IIS) data, submitted from jurisdictions to CDC monthly in aggregate by age group. More information about the IIS can be found at https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/iis/about.html.

• Influenza vaccination coverage estimate numerators include the number of people receiving at least one dose of influenza vaccine in a given flu season, based on information that state, territorial, and local public health agencies report to CDC. Some jurisdictions’ data may include data submitted by tribes. Estimates include persons who are deceased but received a vaccination during the current season. People receiving doses are attributed to the jurisdiction in which the person resides unless noted otherwise. Quality and completeness of data may vary across jurisdictions. Influenza vaccination coverage denominators are obtained from 2020 U.S. Census Bureau population estimates.

• Monthly estimates shown are cumulative, reflecting all persons vaccinated from July through a given month of that flu season. Cumulative estimates include any historical data reported since the previous submission. National estimates are not presented since not all U.S. jurisdictions are currently reporting their IIS data to CDC. Jurisdictions reporting data to CDC include U.S. states, some localities, and territories.

• Because IIS data contain all vaccinations administered within a jurisdiction rather than a sample, standard errors were not calculated and statistical testing for differences in estimates across years were not performed.

• Laws and policies regarding the submission of vaccination data to an IIS vary by state, which may impact the completeness of vaccination coverage reflected for a jurisdiction. More information on laws and policies are found at https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/iis/policy-legislation.html.

• Coverage estimates based on IIS data are expected to differ from National Immunization Survey (NIS) estimates for children (https://www.cdc.gov/flu/fluvaxview/dashboard/vaccination-coverage-race.html) and adults (https://www.cdc.gov/flu/fluvaxview/dashboard/vaccination-adult-coverage.html) because NIS estimates are based on a sample that may not be representative after survey weighting and vaccination status is determined by survey respondent rather than vaccine records or administrations, and quality and completeness of IIS data may vary across jurisdictions. In general, NIS estimates tend to overestimate coverage due to overreporting and IIS estimates may underestimate coverage due to incompleteness of data in certain jurisdictions.

Over 12 million people in the United States died from all causes between the beginning of January 2020 and August 21, 2023. Over 1.1 million of those deaths were with confirmed or presumed COVID-19.

Vaccine rollout in the United States Finding a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine was an urgent health priority since the very start of the pandemic. In the United States, the first two vaccines were authorized and recommended for use in December 2020. One has been developed by Massachusetts-based biotech company Moderna, and the number of Moderna COVID-19 vaccines administered in the U.S. was over 250 million. Moderna has also said that its vaccine is effective against the coronavirus variants first identified in the UK and South Africa.

List of free flu clinics offered throughout Chicago for the 2019-2020 flu season, either by the Department of Public Health or in collaboration with it.

Limited amounts of high-dose flu vaccines for seniors may be available throughout the season. Check https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/cdph/supp_info/health-protection/flu-clinics-in-the-city-of-chicago.html for updates.

This view and the underlying dataset approximately follow https://github.com/codeforamerica/flu-shot-spec/blob/master/data-format.csv and are designed for use by https://github.com/tkompare/chicagoflushots.

For more information about the flu, go to https://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/cdph/provdrs/flu.html.

Weekly Cumulative Influenza Vaccination Coverage Comparison between Current and Previous Season, Children 6 Months through 17 Years, United States

• Influenza vaccination coverage among children is assessed through the National Immunization Survey-Flu (NIS-Flu) annually, providing weekly influenza vaccination coverage estimates for children 6 months–17 years based upon parental report. (https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/imz-managers/nis/about.html)

o NIS-Flu is a national random-digit-dialed cellular telephone survey of households conducted during the flu season (October-June).

• Additional information about NIS-Flu methods and estimates from the 2019-2020 season are available at: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/fluvaxview/coverage-1920estimates.htm. Final estimates for prior seasons and other flu vaccination data are available at CDC’s FluVaxView.: https://www.cdc.gov/flu/fluvaxview/index.htm.

The seasonal influenza (flu) vaccine is designed to protect against those influenza viruses predicted to circulate during the upcoming flu season, but identifying which viruses are likely to circulate is challenging. We use features from phylogenetic trees reconstructed from hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) sequences, together with a support vector machine, to predict future circulation. We obtain accuracies of 0.75–0.89 (Area under the curve AUC 0.83–0.91) over 2016–2020. We explore ways to select potential candidates for a seasonal vaccine and find that the machine learning model has a moderate ability to select strains that are close to future populations. However, consensus sequences among the most recent three years also do well at this task. We identify similar candidate strains to those proposed by the World Health Organization, suggesting that this approach can help inform vaccine strain selection., This repository contains the code, data and materials developed for 'Phylogenetic identification of influenza virus candidates for seasonal vaccines'. We downloaded all hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) human H3N2 sequences collected from 1980 to February 2020 from the Global Initiative on Sharing Avian Influenza Data (GISAID). Accession numbers and references to the GISAID submitting laboratories for the sequences used in this study are included in this repository. As per GISAID access terms, the sequences used in this study are not reproduced here but may be downloaded from the GISAID server.This repository contains all code to compute the features, train and test the machine learning models, predict the next year's flu vaccine candidates, and generate the plots for the paper. Derived data e.g. all the influenza trees for the experiments in years 2016 to 2020 are included. , All data files are in CSV format. All code was written in R (open-source), and influenza trees are included in RDATA files to be read into R. Accession numbers and references to the GISAID submitting laboratories for the sequences used in this study are included in a zip folder. To recreate the analysis in full, these accession numbers may be used to download the influenza sequences directly from GISAID. , # Phylogenetic identification of influenza virus candidates for seasonal vaccines - supporting data and code

This repository contains the code, data and materials developed for 'Phylogenetic identification of influenza virus candidates for seasonal vaccines'. The seasonal influenza (flu) vaccine is designed to protect against those influenza viruses predicted to circulate during the upcoming flu season, but identifying which viruses are likely to circulate is challenging. We use features from phylogenetic trees reconstructed from hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) sequences, together with a support vector machine, to predict future circulation. We obtain accuracies of 0.75-0.89 (Area under the curve AUC 0.83-0.91) over 2016-2020. We explore ways to select potential candidates for a seasonal vaccine and find that the machine learning model has a moderate ability to select strains that are close to future populations. However, consensus sequences among the most recent three y...

In November 2019, 47 percent of U.S. adults aged 30 to 44 years reported that they did not plan on getting vaccinated for the upcoming influenza season, compared to 19 percent of adults aged 65 years and older. This statistic shows the proportion of adults who planned on getting an influenza vaccination for the 2019-2020 flu season in the United States, by age.

Context

New York has presented the most cases compared to all states across the U.S..There have also been critiques regarding how much more unnoticed impact the flu has caused. My dataset allows us to compare whether or not this is true according to the most recent data.

Content

This COVID-19 data is from Kaggle whereas the New York influenza data comes from the U.S. government health data website. I merged the two datasets by county and FIPS code and listed the most recent reports of 2020 COVID-19 cases and deaths alongside the 2019 known influenza cases for comparison.

Acknowledgements

I am thankful to Kaggle and the U.S. government for making the data that made this possible openly available.

Inspiration

This data can be extended to answer the common misconceptions of the scale of the COVID-19 and common flu. My inspiration stems from supporting conclusions with data rather than simply intuition.

I would like my data to help answer how we can make U.S. citizens realize what diseases are most impactful.

In 2019, around 37 percent of U.S. adults who did not plan on getting an influenza vaccination for the 2019-20 flu season stated concerns about possible side effects from the vaccine as a major reason. This statistic shows the percentage of U.S. adults who did not plan to get an influenza vaccination for the 2019-2020 flu season for select reasons.

FluWatch is Canada's national surveillance system that monitors the spread of influenza and influenza-like illnesses on an ongoing basis. FluWatch reports, posted every Friday, contain information on flu activity in Canada. The FluWatch program consists of a network of labs, hospitals, doctor's offices and provincial and territorial ministries of health. Program objectives are: •DETECT: Identify signals to detect, assess and respond to epidemics and other events of public health concern. •INFORM: Contribute to the evidence base necessary to plan, develop and implement health programs and policies for the control of influenza. •ENABLE: Support national infrastructure for influenza surveillance, including national and international collaborations related to surveillance and pandemic response. FluWatch consists of seven surveillance systems components and together they provide a national picture of influenza activity in Canada.

Chicago residents who are up to date with influenza vaccines, based on the reported address, race-ethnicity, sex, and age group of the person vaccinated, as provided by the medical provider in the Illinois Comprehensive Automated Immunization Registry Exchange (I-CARE). “Up to date” refers to individuals aged 6 months and older who have received 1+ doses of influenza vaccine during the current season, defined as the beginning of July (MMWR week 27) through the end of the following June (MMWR week 26). Data Notes: Weekly cumulative counts and coverage percentages of people up to date are shown for each combination of race-ethnicity, sex, and age group. Note that race-ethnicity, age, and sex all have an option for “All” so care should be taken when summing rows. Weeks begin on a Sunday and end on a Saturday. Coverage percentages are calculated based on the cumulative number of people in each race-ethnicity/age/sex population subgroup who are considered up to date as of the week ending date divided by the estimated number of people in that subgroup. Population counts are obtained from the 2020 U.S. Decennial Census. Actual counts may exceed population estimates and lead to coverage estimates that are greater than 100%, especially in smaller demographic groupings with smaller populations. Additionally, the medical provider may report incorrect demographic information for the person receiving the vaccination, which may lead to over- or underestimation of vaccination coverage. All coverage percentages are capped at 99%. The Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) uses the most complete data available to estimate influenza vaccination coverage among Chicagoans, but there are several limitations that impact our estimates. Influenza vaccine administration is not required to be reported in Illinois, except for publicly funded vaccine (e.g., Vaccines for Children, Section 317). Individuals may receive vaccinations that are not recorded in I-CARE, such as those administered in another state, or those administered by a provider that does not submit data to I-CARE, causing underestimation of the number individuals who received an influenza vaccine for the current season. All data are provisional and subject to change. Information is updated as additional details are received and it is, in fact, very common for recent dates to be incomplete and to be updated as time goes on. At any given time, this dataset reflects data currently known to CDPH. Numbers in this dataset may differ from other public sources due to when data are reported and how City of Chicago boundaries are defined. For all datasets related to influenza, see https://data.cityofchicago.org/browse?limitTo=datasets&sortBy=alpha&tags=flu. Data Source: Illinois Comprehensive Automated Immunization Registry Exchange (I-CARE), U.S. Census Bureau 2020 Decennial Census