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.

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.

The mortality rate from influenza in the United States is by far highest among those aged 65 years and older. During the 2023-2024 flu season, the mortality rate from influenza for this age group was around 32.1 per 100,000 population. The burden of influenza The impact of influenza in the U.S. varies from season to season, but in the 2023-2024 flu season, there were an estimated 40 million cases. These cases resulted in around 470,000 hospitalizations. Although most people recover from influenza without requiring medical treatment, the disease can be deadly for young children, the elderly, and those with weakened immune systems or chronic illnesses. During the 2023-2024 flu season, around 28,000 people in the U.S. lost their lives due to influenza. Impact of vaccinations The most effective way to prevent influenza is to receive an annual vaccination at the beginning of flu season. Flu vaccines are safe and can greatly reduce the burden of the disease. During the 2022-2023 flu season, vaccinations prevented around 2,479 deaths among those aged 65 years and older. Although flu vaccines are usually cheap and easily accessible, every year a large share of the population in the U.S. still does not get vaccinated. For example, during the 2022-2023 flu season, only about 35 percent of those aged 18 to 49 years received a flu vaccination.

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.

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.

This dataset is a per-state amalgamation of demographic, public health and other relevant predictors for COVID-19.

Deaths, Infections and Tests by State

The COVID Tracking Project: https://covidtracking.com/data/api

Used positive, death and totalTestResults from the API for, respectively, Infected, Deaths and Tested in this dataset. Please read the documentation of the API for more context on those columns

Predictor Data and Sources

Population (2020)

Density is people per meter squared https://worldpopulationreview.com/states/

ICU Beds and Age 60+

https://khn.org/news/as-coronavirus-spreads-widely-millions-of-older-americans-live-in-counties-with-no-icu-beds/

GDP

https://worldpopulationreview.com/states/gdp-by-state/

Income per capita (2018)

https://worldpopulationreview.com/states/per-capita-income-by-state/

Gini

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_Gini_coefficient

Unemployment (2020)

Rates from Feb 2020 and are percentage of labor force
https://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm

Sex (2017)

Ratio is Male / Female
https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/distribution-by-gender/

Smoking Percentage (2020)

https://worldpopulationreview.com/states/smoking-rates-by-state/

Influenza and Pneumonia Death Rate (2018)

Death rate per 100,000 people
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/flu_pneumonia_mortality/flu_pneumonia.htm

Chronic Lower Respiratory Disease Death Rate (2018)

Death rate per 100,000 people
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/lung_disease_mortality/lung_disease.htm

Active Physicians (2019)

https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/total-active-physicians/

Hospitals (2018)

https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/total-hospitals

Health spending per capita

Includes spending for all health care services and products by state of residence. Hospital spending is included and reflects the total net revenue. Costs such as insurance, administration, research, and construction expenses are not included.
https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/avg-annual-growth-per-capita/

Pollution (2019)

Pollution: Average exposure of the general public to particulate matter of 2.5 microns or less (PM2.5) measured in micrograms per cubic meter (3-year estimate)
https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/annual/measure/air/state/ALL

Medium and Large Airports

For each state, number of medium and large airports https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_busiest_airports_in_the_United_States

Temperature (2019)

Note that FL was incorrect in the table, but is corrected in the Hottest States paragraph
https://worldpopulationreview.com/states/average-temperatures-by-state/
District of Columbia temperature computed as the average of Maryland and Virginia

Urbanization (2010)

Urbanization as a percentage of the population https://www.icip.iastate.edu/tables/population/urban-pct-states

Age Groups (2018)

https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/distribution-by-age/

School Closure Dates

Schools that haven't closed are marked NaN https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/map-coronavirus-and-school-closures.html

Note that some datasets above did not contain data for District of Columbia, this missing data was found via Google searches manually entered.

NNDSS - TABLE 1R. Hepatitis C, perinatal infection to Influenza-associated pediatric mortality - 2020. In this Table, provisional cases* of notifiable diseases are displayed for United States, U.S. territories, and Non-U.S. residents. Notice: Data from California published in week 29 for years 2019 and 2020 were incomplete when originally published on July 24, 2020. On August 4, 2020, incomplete case counts were replaced with a "U" indicating case counts are not available for specified time period. Note: This table contains provisional cases of national notifiable diseases from the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System (NNDSS). NNDSS data from the 50 states, New York City, the District of Columbia and the U.S. territories are collated and published weekly on the NNDSS Data and Statistics web page (https://wwwn.cdc.gov/nndss/data-and-statistics.html). Cases reported by state health departments to CDC for weekly publication are provisional because of the time needed to complete case follow-up. Therefore, numbers presented in later weeks may reflect changes made to these counts as additional information becomes available. The national surveillance case definitions used to define a case are available on the NNDSS web site at https://wwwn.cdc.gov/nndss/. Information about the weekly provisional data and guides to interpreting data are available at: https://wwwn.cdc.gov/nndss/infectious-tables.html. Footnotes: U: Unavailable — The reporting jurisdiction was unable to send the data to CDC or CDC was unable to process the data. -: No reported cases — The reporting jurisdiction did not submit any cases to CDC. N: Not reportable — The disease or condition was not reportable by law, statute, or regulation in the reporting jurisdiction. NN: Not nationally notifiable — This condition was not designated as being nationally notifiable. NP: Nationally notifiable but not published. NC: Not calculated — There is insufficient data available to support the calculation of this statistic. Cum: Cumulative year-to-date counts. Max: Maximum — Maximum case count during the previous 52 weeks. * Case counts for reporting years 2019 and 2020 are provisional and subject to change. Cases are assigned to the reporting jurisdiction submitting the case to NNDSS, if the case's country of usual residence is the U.S., a U.S. territory, unknown, or null (i.e. country not reported); otherwise, the case is assigned to the 'Non-U.S. Residents' category. Country of usual residence is currently not reported by all jurisdictions or for all conditions. For further information on interpretation of these data, see https://wwwn.cdc.gov/nndss/document/Users_guide_WONDER_tables_cleared_final.pdf. †Previous 52 week maximum and cumulative YTD are determined from periods of time when the condition was reportable in the jurisdiction (i.e., may be less than 52 weeks of data or incomplete YTD data). § Please refer to the CDC WONDER publication for weekly updates to the footnote for this condition.

National distribution of all-cause mortality by select causes of death, ages 25+.

As of January 6, 2022, an average of 1,192 people per day have died from COVID-19 in the U.S. since the first case was confirmed in the country on January 20th the year before. On an average day, nearly 8,000 people die from all causes in the United States, based on data from 2019. Based on the latest information, roughly one in seven deaths each day were related to COVID-19 between January 2020 and January 2022. However, there were even days when more than every second death in the U.S. was connected to COVID-19. The daily death toll from the seasonal flu, using preliminary maximum estimates from the 2019-2020 influenza season, stood at an average of around 332 people. We have to keep in mind that a comparison of influenza and COVID-19 is somewhat difficult. COVID-19 cases and deaths are counted continuously since the begin of the pandemic, whereas flue counts are seasonal and often less accurate. Furthermore, during the last two years, COVID-19 more or less 'replaced' the flu, with COVID-19 absorbing potential flu cases. Many countries reported a very weak seasonal flu activity during the COVID-19 pandemic. But it has yet to be seen how the two infectious diseases will develop side by side during the winter season 2021/2022 and in the years to come.

Symptoms and self-isolation COVID-19 and influenza share similar symptoms – a cough, runny nose, and tiredness – and telling the difference between the two can be difficult. If you have minor symptoms, there is no need to seek urgent medical care, but it is recommended that you self-isolate, whereas rules vary from country to country. Additionally, rules depend on someone's vaccination status and infection history. However, if you think you have the disease, a diagnostic test can show if you have an active infection.

Scientists alert to coronavirus mutations The genetic material of the novel coronavirus is RNA, not DNA. Other notable human diseases caused by RNA viruses include SARS, Ebola, and influenza. A continual problem that vaccine developers encounter is that viruses can mutate, and a treatment developed against a certain virus type may not work on a mutated form. The seasonal flu vaccine, for example, is different each year because influenza viruses are frequently mutating, and it is critical that those genetic changes continue to be tracked.

Influenza and pneumonia caused around 10.9 deaths in the U.S. per 100,000 population in 2023. Influenza, or the flu, is a viral infection that is highly contagious and especially common in the winter season. Influenza is a common cause of pneumonia, although most cases of the flu do not develop into pneumonia. Pneumonia is an infection or inflammation of the lungs and is particularly deadly among young children and the elderly. Influenza cases Influenza is very common in the United States, with an estimated 40 million cases reported in 2023-2024. Common symptoms of the flu include cough, fever, runny or stuffy nose, sore throat and headache. Symptoms can be mild but can also be severe enough to require medical attention. In 2023-2024, there were around 18 million influenza-related medical visits in the United States. Prevention To prevent contracting the flu, people can take everyday precautions such as regularly washing their hands and avoiding those who are sick, but the best way to prevent the flu is by receiving the flu vaccination every year. Receiving a flu vaccination is especially important for young children and the elderly, as they are most susceptible to flu complications and associated death. In 2024, around 70 percent of those aged 65 years and older received a flu vaccine, while only 33 percent of those aged 18 to 49 years had done so.

All-cause, COVID-19, and non-COVID-19 ASDR for ages 25+ by state and time period.

How did Brazil become a global epicenter of the outbreak? After seeming to ease, is the virus making a comeback?

A world leader in infections and deaths.

Latin America became an epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic in May, driven by Brazil’s ballooning caseload. Ten months after its first known case, Brazil has had more than 7.9 million cases and over 200,000 deaths.

In early June, Brazil began averaging about 1,000 deaths per day from Covid-19, joining the United States — and later India — as the countries with the world’s largest death tolls.

This dataset contains information about COVID-19 in Brazil extracted on the date 16/06/2021. It is the most updated dataset available about Covid in Brazil

Features:

🔍 date: date that the data was collected. format YYYY-MM-DD.
🔍 state: Abbreviation for States. Example: SP
🔍 city: Name of the city (if the value is NaN, they are referring to the State, not the city)
🔍 place_type: Can be City or State
🔍 order_for_place: Number that identifies the registering order for this location. The line that refers to the first log is going to be shown as 1, and the following information will start the count as an index.
🔍 is_last: Show if the line was the last update from that place, can be True or False
🔍 city_ibge_code: IBGE Code from the location
🔍confirmed: Number of confirmed cases.
🔍deaths: Number of deaths.
🔍estimated_population: Estimated population for this city/state in 2020. Data from IBGE
🔍estimated_population_2019: Estimated population for this city/state in 2019. Data from IBGE.
🔍confirmed_per_100k_inhabitants: Number of confirmed cases per 100.000 habitants (based on estimated_population).
🔍death_rate: Death rate (deaths / confirmed cases).

Acknowledgements

This dataset was downloaded from the URL bello. Thanks, Brasil.IO! Their main goal is to make all Brazilian data available to the public DATASET URL: https://brasil.io/dataset/covid19/files/ Cities map file https://geoftp.ibge.gov.br/organizacao_do_territorio/malhas_territoriais/malhas_municipais/municipio_2020/Brasil/BR/

Similar Datasets

COVID-19 - https://www.kaggle.com/rafaelherrero/covid19-brazil-full-cases-17062021 COVID-19 - https://www.kaggle.com/imdevskp/corona-virus-report MERS - https://www.kaggle.com/imdevskp/mers-outbreak-dataset-20122019 Ebola Western Africa 2014 Outbreak - https://www.kaggle.com/imdevskp/ebola-outbreak-20142016-complete-dataset H1N1 | Swine Flu 2009 Pandemic Dataset - https://www.kaggle.com/imdevskp/h1n1-swine-flu-2009-pandemic-dataset SARS 2003 Pandemic - https://www.kaggle.com/imdevskp/sars-outbreak-2003-complete-dataset HIV AIDS - https://www.kaggle.com/imdevskp/hiv-aids-dataset

Rank, number of deaths, percentage of deaths, and age-specific mortality rates for the leading causes of death, by age group and sex, 2000 to most recent year.

In the United States, the highest rate of hospitalizations due to influenza are among those aged 65 years and older. During the 2023-2024 flu season, the rate of hospitalizations due to influenza among this age group was about 401 per 100,000 population, compared to a rate of around 47 per 100,000 for those aged 5 to 17 years. Influenza is a common viral infection that usually does not require medical treatment. However, for the very young, the old, and those with certain pre-existing conditions, influenza can be serious and even deadly. The burden of influenza in the United States The impact of influenza in the United States varies from year to year depending on the strain that is most prevalent during that season and the immunity in the population. Preliminary estimates show that around 28,000 people died from influenza during the 2023-2024 flu season. However, during the 2017-2018 flu season, an estimated 52,000 people lost their lives to influenza. The importance of flu vaccines The best way to avoid catching the flu and to reduce the virus’s overall burden on society is by receiving an annual flu vaccination. The CDC currently recommends that everyone over 6 months of age should get a flu vaccination every year, preferably by the end of October. The flu vaccine is safe, efficient, and reduces the number of illnesses, hospitalizations, and deaths caused by the virus. For example, during the 2022-2023 flu season, it was estimated that vaccinations averted almost 65 thousand influenza-related hospitalizations. However, despite the proven benefits and wide availability of flu vaccinations, a large percentage of people in the United States fail to receive a vaccination every year. During the 2022-2023 flu season, only about 35 percent of those aged 18 to 49 years were vaccinated against influenza, compared to 70 percent of those aged 65 years and older.

As of May 2, 2023, the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) had spread to almost every country in the world, and more than 6.86 million people had died after contracting the respiratory virus. Over 1.16 million of these deaths occurred in the United States.

Waves of infections Almost every country and territory worldwide have been affected by the COVID-19 disease. At the end of 2021 the virus was once again circulating at very high rates, even in countries with relatively high vaccination rates such as the United States and Germany. As rates of new infections increased, some countries in Europe, like Germany and Austria, tightened restrictions once again, specifically targeting those who were not yet vaccinated. However, by spring 2022, rates of new infections had decreased in many countries and restrictions were once again lifted.

What are the symptoms of the virus? It can take up to 14 days for symptoms of the illness to start being noticed. The most commonly reported symptoms are a fever and a dry cough, leading to shortness of breath. The early symptoms are similar to other common viruses such as the common cold and flu. These illnesses spread more during cold months, but there is no conclusive evidence to suggest that temperature impacts the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Medical advice should be sought if you are experiencing any of these symptoms.

The leading causes of death in the United States have changed significantly from the year 1900 to the present. Leading causes of death in 1900, such as tuberculosis, gastrointestinal infections, and diphtheria have seen huge decreases in death rates and are no longer among the leading causes of death in the United States. However, other diseases such as heart disease and cancer have seen increased death rates. Vaccinations One major factor contributing to the decrease in death rates for many diseases since the year 1900 is the introduction of vaccinations. The decrease seen in the rates of death due to pneumonia and influenza is a prime example of this. In 1900, pneumonia and influenza were the leading causes of death, with around *** deaths per 100,000 population. However, in 2023 pneumonia and influenza were not even among the ten leading causes of death. Cancer One disease that has seen a large increase in death rates since 1900 is cancer. Cancer currently accounts for almost ** percent of all deaths in the United States, with death rates among men higher than those for women. The deadliest form of cancer for both men and women is cancer of the lung and bronchus. Some of the most common avoidable risk factors for cancer include smoking, drinking alcohol, sun exposure, and obesity.

The child mortality rate in the United States, for children under the age of five, was 462.9 deaths per thousand births in 1800. This means that for every thousand babies born in 1800, over 46 percent did not make it to their fifth birthday. Over the course of the next 220 years, this number has dropped drastically, and the rate has dropped to its lowest point ever in 2020 where it is just seven deaths per thousand births. Although the child mortality rate has decreased greatly over this 220 year period, there were two occasions where it increased; in the 1870s, as a result of the fourth cholera pandemic, smallpox outbreaks, and yellow fever, and in the late 1910s, due to the Spanish Flu pandemic.