GAC06 said:

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PJYoung said:

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agforlife97 said:

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We know that flu has basically disappeared. So it stands to reason that many deaths we've chalked up to covid are probably flu cases that were false positive covid cases.

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No. Talk to any doctor. They have been testing for flu like any season and it's almost completely gone.

Our Covid mitigation efforts have knocked the flu out completely which should tell you how contagious Covid is but I know a certain segment of our population will choose to believe otherwise.

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There have been a wide range of policies attempting to control covid worldwide. How have flu numbers varied country to country?

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https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/uritheflu/88676

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Below the equator, the numbers also point to a dramatically reduced flu season. Australia, Chile, and South Africa, where winter is now ending, reported just 55 positive specimens total across the three countries out of 83,307 tested (0.06%, 95% CI 0.04%-0.08%) during April-July compared to 25,000 specimens testing positive of 178,690 in 2019 (13.7%, 95% CI 13.6%-13.9%).

Olsen and colleagues said COVID-related community mitigation measures, if continued through the fall, could keep influenza down in the U.S. this winter.

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A good view of hospitalizations - probably shared elsewhere but I hadn't seen it. Includes comorbidity stats for hospitalized cases.

https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/covidnet/COVID19_5.html

PJYoung said:

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GAC06 said:

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PJYoung said:

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agforlife97 said:

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We know that flu has basically disappeared. So it stands to reason that many deaths we've chalked up to covid are probably flu cases that were false positive covid cases.

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No. Talk to any doctor. They have been testing for flu like any season and it's almost completely gone.

Our Covid mitigation efforts have knocked the flu out completely which should tell you how contagious Covid is but I know a certain segment of our population will choose to believe otherwise.

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There have been a wide range of policies attempting to control covid worldwide. How have flu numbers varied country to country?

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https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/uritheflu/88676

Quote:

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Below the equator, the numbers also point to a dramatically reduced flu season. Australia, Chile, and South Africa, where winter is now ending, reported just 55 positive specimens total across the three countries out of 83,307 tested (0.06%, 95% CI 0.04%-0.08%) during April-July compared to 25,000 specimens testing positive of 178,690 in 2019 (13.7%, 95% CI 13.6%-13.9%).

Olsen and colleagues said COVID-related community mitigation measures, if continued through the fall, could keep influenza down in the U.S. this winter.

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Flu down worldwide doesn't really support the idea that it's due to covid mitigation

I haven't been to Australia but I've seen articles touting how they're living normally without covid. Why is there no flu?

bay fan said:

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Gilligan said:

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Post inauguration a positive case is only reported if a person tests positive twice and shows symptoms.

Look it up...

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I don't want to make this a F16 thread but I did look it up and there is literally zero information to support that claim. If it's true, please provide proof.

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https://www.who.int/news/item/20-01-2021-who-information-notice-for-ivd-users-2020-05

I think it may be a bit overstated but its not that far off. The WHO statement says the below:

WHO guidance Diagnostic testing for SARS-CoV-2 states that careful interpretation of weak positive results is needed (1). The cycle threshold (Ct) needed to detect virus is inversely proportional to the patient's viral load. Where test results do not correspond with the clinical presentation, a new specimen should be taken and retested using the same or different NAT technology.

WHO reminds IVD users that disease prevalence alters the predictive value of test results; as disease prevalence decreases, the risk of false positive increases (2). This means that the probability that a person who has a positive result (SARS-CoV-2 detected) is truly infected with SARS-CoV-2 decreases as prevalence decreases, irrespective of the claimed specificity.

I know that's a lot of medical gobbledygook but I read it to say if someone tests positive but isn't showing symptoms they should be retested to avoid a false positive test. The date on that guidance is January 13, 2021 so I can see how people interpreted it the way they did.

GAC06 said:

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I haven't been to Australia but I've seen articles touting how they're living normally without covid. Why is there no flu?

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I am guessing they weren't living normally - I do know somebody in Perth so I will be interested to hear what she says about it.

Quote:

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All states in Australia varied in their shutdowns measures, but they all saw declines in flu as well as other respiratory viruses and diseases such as RSV, metapneumovirus, and pneumococcal disease, Barr said.

In August 2019, which is typically Australia's peak month for cases, there were 61,084 cases. In 2020, there were just 121 cases.

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GAC06 said:

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I haven't been to Australia but I've seen articles touting how they're living normally without covid. Why is there no flu?

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It's also summer in Australia, which if it's like the US, plays a huge part in the flu disappearing during the summer months.

Quote:

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The sharp reduction in cases is probably due to Australia's decision to shut its borders on 20 March and ban non-essential gatherings to try to stop the spread of covid-19, says Robert Booy at the University of Sydney. "We're not importing any flu and anything that stops close contact with others is going to make it harder for the influenza virus to transmit," he says.
The government implemented a ban on non-essential gatherings of more than 500 people on 16 March. This gradually ramped up to a more complete lockdown on 23 March when pubs, restaurants, gyms, cinemas and other non-essential businesses were forced to close.

Read more: Australia seems to be keeping a lid on covid-19 how is it doing it?

Additionally, very few children have been attending school since mid-March, when states and territories began encouraging remote learning where possible.

This is probably another reason why flu cases are down, since schoolchildren are known to be major spreaders of the influenza virus in normal years, says Kirsty Short at the University of Queensland.

Covid-19 lockdown measures also seem to have brought an early end to the flu season in Hong Kong, which normally extends to March or April, but this year tailed off in February.


Read more: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2242113-australia-sees-huge-decrease-in-flu-cases-due-to-coronavirus-measures/#ixzz6ka4bvO3E

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But even if the restrictions are eased, we could still see a reduction in flu cases due to changes in people's behaviour, says Short. "People are washing their hands more and instead of having the attitude that they can still go to work if they're sick, they now know to stay home if they have respiratory symptoms," she says.

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Maybe, and I could be crazy, but there aren't any holiday gatherings since 1/1/21. I know, crazy talk.

Crazy conspiracy brain : Tariffs and trade wars were bad for China. The US Administration implementing those measures is now gone, in some small part possibly due to pandemic handling. So, China has now sent out the worldwide RF signals that disable their engineered virus.

The Big12Ag said:

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Crazy conspiracy brain : Tariffs and trade wars were bad for China. The US Administration implementing those measures is now gone, in some small part possibly due to pandemic handling. So, China has now sent out the worldwide RF signals that disable their engineered virus.

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BUT WHAT ABOUT THE NEW VARIANTS?????

But the mutations are going to get us all. We can handle the super strains but the uber strains are going to be hell

Very simple: a combination of seasonality starting to manifest, and the portion of the population that is most likely to catch this because of activity or odds of exposure and then seek testing due to exposure or symptoms has already been infected where disease prevalence is high, so a form of localized herd immunity is manifesting to a significant degree as the local populations of people that are particularly vulnerable to infection and have not yet contracted it diminishes, which relates back to seasonality. We're settled into post holidays late winter behavior patterns and that typically results in a falloff of many diseases spread like CoVID, I should think.

This is conjecture, but I think reasonable until data demonstrates otherwise.

That's true. But where the previous administration rejected that actions of the WHO the new administration has already said they will support the Who. That doesn't mean they will or will not follow the guidance but they are more likely to than the previous one would have except this seems like a case of reversed alignment. I would say who knows what will happen but WHO doesn't know what will happen.

Sorry, I thought you were responding to a different post. I have not seen anything about the CDC changing testing guidelines. Only the WHO, who in my opinion has little credibility at this stage.