To put recent news—of #influenza deaths exceeding #covid deaths—in context, #CDC now has preliminary #flu burden estimates for season ended Sept 2024.
#PublicHealth surveillance systems have never been adequate for tracking flu, so CDC uses models to arrive at estimates.
By comparison, covid mortality reflects actual deaths reported as due to covid. There's no comparable covid burden modeling being done, so covid deaths believed misreported—as "natural causes" or otherwise—don't show up in this figure.
End of last flu season, annualized covid mortality was more than double estimated influenza burden deaths.
Covid death reporting began sharp deceleration in December, after spike in July/August. Such drop-off in reporting must be taken into account when comparing mortality stats.
Won't likely see flu burden estimates for this new season until early next year. But we know non-#BirdFlu flu is stressing hospitals, and #H5N1 cases have gone unrecognized.