As the number of cases of COVID continues to surge, the other winter respiratory infections are at historic lows. Clinical labs in the United States testing more than 20,000 nasal swabs for influenza found that only 40, just .2% came back positive. Last year at this time, 11% of the swabs were positive for influenza. The Children’s Health Hospital in Dallas reports a sharp decrease in RSV, a virus that can cause a severe respiratory illness in children. In 2019, Children’s Hospital saw almost 900 cases of this potentially fatal virus. This year, there was only one.
The Centers For Disease Control and Prevention believe that these welcome numbers are due to public health measures including social distancing, wearing a mask, and frequent handwashing.
