Flu is a much bigger, more pressing threat than flashy new coronavirus

The rapidly spreading virus has closed schools in Knoxville, Tenn., cut blood donations to dangerous levels in Cleveland and prompted limits on hospital visitors in Wilson, N.C. More ominously, it has infected as many as 26 million people in the United States in just four months, killing up to 25,000 so far.

In other words, a difficult but not extraordinary flu season in the United States, the kind most people shrug off each winter or handle with rest, fluids and pain relievers if they contract the illness.

But this year, a new coronavirus from China has focused attention on diseases that can sweep through an entire population, rattling the public despite the current magnitude of the threat. The flu poses the bigger and more pressing peril; just eight cases of the new respiratory illness have been reported in the United States, none of them fatal or apparently even life-threatening.

“Anything that we don’t feel we have sufficient information about feels like a threat,” said Lynn Bufka, senior director of practice research and policy at the American Psychological Association and an expert on anxiety. “The flu doesn’t feel novel. Most people’s experience with the flu is they’ve had it, they’ve recovered, it’s not a big deal — despite the fact that thousands of people die every year.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 8.6 million to 12 million people have visited healthcare providers complaining of influenza-like symptoms, such as fever, coughing, sneezing and aches since the flu season began Oct. 1. As many as 310,000 people have been hospitalized, and 68 children have died.

On the CDC’s map of flu activity, most of the nation is a deep red, indicating the highest level of “influenza-like illness” activity.

The entire school district serving Knoxville and Knox County, Tenn., which has 57,800 students, shut down this past week because of flu circulating among students and staffers. In Cuyahoga County, Ohio, which includes Cleveland, 218 people have died; 2,500 have shown up in emergency rooms in the city alone, said Merle Gordon, director of the city’s Department of Public Health. In Arkansas, nine school districts have closed, 33 people have died and hospitalizations have increased sharply in the past two weeks.

“We’re being hit right now, a lot of communities at the same time,” said Jennifer Dillaha, medical director for immunizations and outbreak response for the Arkansas Department of Health.