What is ‘super flu’?
Professor Meghana Pandit, NHS national medical director, said: “With record demand for A&E and ambulances and an impending resident doctors strike, this unprecedented wave of super flu is leaving the NHS facing a worst-case scenario for this time of year.”
Although this term has now been repeated frequently in the media, it was not intended as a new scientific designation. Although the flu season began early, both the spread of the virus and the severity of illness remain within what experts consider normal for a flu season.
Influenza viruses are constantly evolving to evade our immune system, which is why the flu vaccine must be updated regularly. Some years the virus mutates more than others, and it typically undergoes a major change every four to five years.
The “subtype” of flu that is dominant this year, called influenza A/H3N2, has been around since 1968 and there have been over a dozen such changes in that time. By this definition, we see “super flu” every few years.
Read the full article on The Conversation website written by James Hay, Research Fellow at the Nuffield Department of Medicine.
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