Five flu deaths reported; season’s toll rises to 210

Five more flu-related deaths were reported to the state last week, bringing the death toll from the current flu season to 210, state health officials told legislators on Monday.

Meanwhile, the number of people getting sick with the flu has continued to decline.

“We’re seeing a clear downtrend” in new infections, Nate Smith, director of the state Department of Health, told the House and Senate public health committees.

“Although there will continue to be influenza activity at some level in the state, probably for several weeks, we are clearly past the worst of it.”

The death toll in February surpassed the 110 people who died in the 2014-15 season, which had been the state’s deadliest since the Health Department began tracking flu deaths in 2000.

All of the deaths reported last week were people age 45 or older. As of last Tuesday, 188 of the deaths had been people who were 45 or older.

Smith said the number of deaths will likely continue rising as people hospitalized with the flu die from infections and other complications.

Although the department last week reported an increase in the percentage of patients who had flu-like symptoms while visiting doctors, that figure has been revised based on additional information submitted by doctors.

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1.9 percent of Arkansas patients who visited the doctor during the week that ended March 24 had flulike symptoms, down from 2.4 percent a week earlier.

Among patients visiting emergency rooms through Friday, 1.3 percent had flulike symptoms, down from 1.6 percent a week earlier, the Health Department reported.

With a month or two before the flu season ends, State

Epidemiologist Dirk Haselow said, those who haven’t gotten a flu shot this season should still do so.

The shots are available at no charge to the patient from the Health Department’s county offices.

Smith said an effort to publicize the availability of the shot spurred an increase in patients going into the offices. So far, the department has administered about 225,000 shots, he said.

Last year, the department administered about 217,000 shots, spokesman Meg Mirivel said.

Of the people who have died from the flu this season, at least 44 had been vaccinated and 87 had not. Whether the others who died had been vaccinated hadn’t been determined, Mirivel said.