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Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#281

Post by taeric »

JulianMorrison wrote: post #269

Maybe we were too callous just allowing the ordinary flu to run rampant, and we should consider in future doing things like masking up when a flu season is expected, so as to stop the disease from killing thousands of old people. And also possibly consider going for full eradication rather than harm reduction. Can flu jabs be made more effective, and multi-strain, using mRNA vaccine technology? That's a genuinely new…

My money is on schools being a more active vector than makes sense. And I don't see us closing them like we did on a regular basis.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#283

Post by mmmrtl »

timr wrote: post #271
Majromax wrote: post #237

This should not come as a surprise, and it was largely predictable from the outset. The flu has a base reproduction number (R0) less than 2 ( https://www.vdh.virginia.gov/coronavirus/2020/12/07/covid-19... ). Covid has an R0 in the vicinity of 2.5 ( https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scena... ). In the meantime, public health measures like masking and distancing will work against both viruses. If…

> This should not come as a surprise, and it was largely predictable from the outset....the flu has a base reproduction number (R0) less than 2....Covid has an R0 in the vicinity of 2.5....In the meantime, public health measures like masking and distancing will work against both viruses....there's really no need for conspiracy theorizing. Assuming that this is due to "masking and distancing" and the small difference…

Possible explanations include:

- More asymptomatic transmission of rhinovirus/enterovirus and adenoviruses than influenza. People often don't notice these illnesses, so wouldn't assume it is COVID and quarantine like they would for influenza.

- More fomite spread than influenza. They may be more stable on surfaces or in food

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#284

Post by joshgel »

timr wrote: post #271
Majromax wrote: post #237

This should not come as a surprise, and it was largely predictable from the outset. The flu has a base reproduction number (R0) less than 2 ( https://www.vdh.virginia.gov/coronavirus/2020/12/07/covid-19... ). Covid has an R0 in the vicinity of 2.5 ( https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scena... ). In the meantime, public health measures like masking and distancing will work against both viruses. If…

> This should not come as a surprise, and it was largely predictable from the outset....the flu has a base reproduction number (R0) less than 2....Covid has an R0 in the vicinity of 2.5....In the meantime, public health measures like masking and distancing will work against both viruses....there's really no need for conspiracy theorizing. Assuming that this is due to "masking and distancing" and the small difference…

2 was published in Feb 2020, so not sure how helpful that is...

1 is not normalized data. It does not account for testing frequency. These percentages are of tests using BioFire. My hospital, for example, does not use BioFire to test for SARS-CoV-2 and so we end up running BioFire much, much less frequently than during a normal year.

Anecdotally non-COVID respiratory infections in hospitalized patients have decreased dramatically. Working on trying to demonstrate this with data.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#285

Post by papito »

gorbachev wrote: post #262

I was just commenting to a co-worker my entire family hasn't been sick since the pandemic started. That is very unusual for a family with young children. No flu, no stomach viruses, absolutely nothing for more than a year now. Thankfully no covid-19 either.

Stomach viruses. Where in the world are you? No, seriously - where? Because here in the United States people don't wash their hands before eating. It's fucking gross. I always sanitize my hands with alcohol pads before eating out - ALWAYS. But the others grab subway poles, handles, those nasty menus, and THEN they grab that sandwich with the same hands.

If anything should come out of this pandemic, it should be Americans following basic hygiene. And I mean - basic. Hand sanitizer should be at every table.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#286

Post by datguacdoh »

gorbachev wrote: post #262

I was just commenting to a co-worker my entire family hasn't been sick since the pandemic started. That is very unusual for a family with young children. No flu, no stomach viruses, absolutely nothing for more than a year now. Thankfully no covid-19 either.

Household with two young children, both under 4, and can confirm we have noticed the same thing. No one has been sick since last year; it's been one of the few bright spots over this time.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#287

Post by thebruce87m »

rajin444 wrote: post #170
panarky wrote: post #89

Every community has a baseline mortality rate during "normal" times. During abnormal times like pandemic, famine and war, more people die than usual, but often the cause isn't known. If you subtract baseline mortality from actual mortality to get excess mortality, that's often a better estimate of the casualties from pandemic, famine and war than the death certificates for every person who died. Excess mortality in m…

> And if there are fewer deaths from flu, and fewer from suicide [1], then excess mortality itself is under-reported and Covid killed even more than we thought. The majority of covid deaths are those that on average had very few months left to live. There is a likely a high chance these people were going to die to the next "flu" that came around. How do you account for this? It seems like adding flu deaths on top of…

If they only had a few months left to live, we should see a spike in the opposite direction for excess mortality. You can monitor this yourself for some countries here: https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#288

Post by taeric »

yosito wrote: post #3

While I think this is most likely due to masking, distancing and staying home when sick, which were all far more effective against the flu than against SARS-CoV-2, I wonder how much this was affected by some of the deep cleans that cities were doing at the beginning of the pandemic where they basically sprayed entire cities with disinfectant trucks. Does anyone with more expertise have any thoughts about that?

Odd that you don't mention closed schools. My model has those far higher in this than anything I personally do.

That is, as a parent, I was far less prone to sickness before I had kids of school age. From all I have ever heard, I am far from unique in that.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#289

Post by chrisco255 »

JulianMorrison wrote: post #259
eecc wrote: post #245

Hopefully this won't cause selective pressure on flu viruses to become more aggressive.

If a more infectious variant surfaced, it might spread. But a lower absolute prevalence of flu (because of masks, social distancing, and lockdowns) means that low probability events - like a more virulent strain emerging - are less likely, and might not occur at all. Contrariwise this (beside basic humanity) is why the current out of control situation in India or Brazil is everyone's problem. High absolute prevalence…

Diseases have no trouble spreading through ordinary intimate social interactions with friends and family. In fact, you're far more likely to get sick from someone you are close to and spend hours with than someone you just pass by in a retail store. Lockdowns and mask policy are not neatly correlated with lower infection rates or death counts. Simple counterfactual example is Florida vs. California. Same results, vastly different policies. One has been open with no masking, no limits on indoor capacity, etc for over 9 months, and one has tightly restricted public congregation. Same results. Disproves the hypothesis.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#290

Post by pchristensen »

wombatpm wrote: post #274
bombcar wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect a significant reduction of flu vectors is simply closed schools.

While I have two myself, I am the first to say it: Children are disease carrying vermin

My phrase is "The world is a filthy biological soup", so the less we're in the world, the less covered in soup we are.
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