Flu-like illnesses continue to trend up, according to the Kane County Health Department’s weekly influenza summary. And as you can see by the red line in the graphic above, the season is starting earlier and spiking more quickly than in previous years since 2009-10.

For Week 47, which ran from Nov. 16 to Nov. 24, about 7  percent of participating hospital emergency-room cases were due to flu-like illnesses. That’s 51 percent higher than Week 46, which was up 66 percent from Week 45.

Kane County’s surveillance summary includes the collection of data from hospital emergency rooms, laboratories and public schools.

During Week 47, labs reported that 208 of 733 specimens tested for influenza were positive. Of the 208 positive specimens tested, 195 (93.8 percent) were positive for influenza A, 11 (5.3 percent) were positive for influenza B and 2 (1 percent) were positive for A and B. No other specimen tested positive for week ending Nov. 22, 2014.

Although the number of cases is trending up, Kane County Health Department statistics indicate absenteeism in schools has not been high. The absenteeism rate for schools in Kane County was at an average of 0.37 percent during Week 46, and no public school in the County had ILI absenteeism rate above the 5 percent threshold.

The other good news? No cases of Influenza-related ICU admissions and no deaths were reported to the health department in this reporting period, and to date, no outbreaks of Influenza have been reported from long term care/assisted living facilities. 

Read More

• Access Full Report Here
• KCHD Website Main Flu Page
• CDC Influenza/Flu Main Page 
• IDPH Influenza/Flu Main Page
• Flu.gov 

SOURCE: Kane County Health Department