By Kalvin Yu, MD, FIDSA, Vice President of U.S. Medical Affairs and Vikas Gupta, Pharm.D., Director of Medical Affairs

Our fifth weekly snapshot of viral infections across the U.S. presents data following the Thanksgiving holiday.  In last week’s snapshot , we reported that hospital discharges for flu were approaching those of COVID-19 discharges for the first time. Notably, they are now equal – with hospital discharges for flu catching up to hospital discharges for COVID-19 in the past week. Hospital discharges for RSV have remained stable.

Here is what our data show through December 3:

FLU
Hospital discharges for flu continue to rapidly increase week over week. We are currently seeing hospital discharge rates of 3.7/100 discharges – compared to 2.5/100 discharges last week. As the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shared on Monday, flu hospitalizations have reached the highest level in a decade for this point of the year.
 

COVID-19
Like flu, COVID-19 hospital discharge rates have increased and are also at 3.7/100 discharges – compared to 3.0/100 discharges last week.  This is our first weekly snapshot showing a notable increase in rates of COVID-19 hospital discharges. As we emphasized in our previous blog posts, a mid-December increase in the rate of COVID-19 hospital discharges was reported last year. This could further strain health system capacity this holiday season, given current demands due to other respiratory illnesses, like flu and RSV, compared to 2020 and 2021.  
 

RSV
The RSV hospital discharge rate has remained stable this week – 0.98/100 discharges compared to 1.02/100 discharges last week. Children, ≤ 4 years old, continue to be the most impacted by RSV hospitalizations, and currently represent 45 percent of RSV hospital discharges.
 

About BD Infectious Disease Insights
Emerging infectious diseases have been increasing in frequency during the past few decades. None have tested the U.S. health care system’s capacity or resiliency like COVID-19 – forever changing the way that we think about future outbreaks and how we manage the related unintended consequences. The BD Infectious Disease Insights series investigates today’s most prominent infectious disease trends. The series leverages the depth and breadth of our data to serve as an ongoing bellwether on the state of infectious diseases in the U.S., backed by clinical insights on how to increase overall awareness and preparedness.