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Travelers walk through Union Station as they travel ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday in Washington, DC, November 21, 2023. (credit:
Getty | Saul Loeb
)
As Americans prepare for the Thanksgiving holiday this week, respiratory viruses are ramping up, creating hazardously infectious conditions for mass travel and multi-generational family gatherings.
Flu is on the rise in most of the country, with six Southern states and the District of Columbia already seeing high levels of influenza-like illnesses (ILI) activity. Louisiana has reached "very high" ILI activity, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in
the latest flu surveillance update
. The percentage of flu tests coming back positive is also increasing nationwide, with only one region, the Mid-Atlantic region, showing a stable week-over-week positivity rate. But the CDC noted that its rate overall is trending upward.
This year's flu season is again starting early; the current flu activity levels are about four to six weeks ahead of when we usually see them. And with activity already at highs in many states, there's a good chance that we'll once again see extremely high levels in some places—moving from red to the dreaded deep purple on CDC's scale, which we saw last year.