The influenza virus has walloped the country this winter, causing twice as many deaths in California since the respiratory virus season began in July as the final tolls from the past several seasons.
An estimated 1,323 Californians have succumbed to the flu as of the week ending March 8, including 19 children. And this season for the first time since 2020 the flu deaths overtook COVID deaths.
Last week’s update from the state health department shows signs of the death rate slowing, with 86 new deaths reported last week. Between 140 and 190 were reported in each of the four weeks before that.
Surveillance of pediatric flu deaths did not begin until 2003, but since then the deadliest flu season for children was the 2008-2009 flu season, when 37 children reportedly died in the state.
In this decade and the last, the deadliest flu seasons have killed about 50,000 people around the country. The 2014-15 flu season was estimated to have a death toll of around 51,000, and the 2017-18 had a slightly higher estimate of about 52,000, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.