Thread by @MackayIM

😷Latest excellent weekly report on respiratory virus detections from the Australian State of NSW from @NSWHealth, up to last Saturday (21st).
🤒Look at this for the *trends* not as a perfect capture of every case.
health.nsw.gov.au/Infectious/cov…

😷Of course, SARS-CoV-2 is a respiratory virus so I'm including it here.
🤒Its numbers dwarf all other viruses in this report sitting relatively stably, at 10,000 reported per day, with a steady majority being RATs, the rest PCRs. 86 deaths were reported.

😷#Flu lab detections have risen impressively fast. Of those typed, most are Flu A/H3N2 (red) viruses with some A/H1N1 (orange) viruses.
🤒No obvious visible sign of B/Yamagata or B/Victoria lineage viruses or their variants.

😷Among the other respiratory viruses reported, there is a coincident, often steep rise in AdVs, RSVs, MPVs, EVs and RVs.
🤒There must be a huge burden of disease in the community right now.

😷Emergency department presentations that were admitted for influenza-like illnesses support this burden. Early, steep and high rise.

😷Emergency department presentations that were admitted for 'coronaviruses/SARS'-like illnesses also support this burden. Dropped off, but still nearly twice the load of the ILI admissions.
🤒Test positivity % is at 12.8% and slowly declining

😷Those who know me know I think little of Flutracking data.
You can see here, if you had no labs, it would say there's some fever & cough. But it notes a decline in this reporting period. Misleading & unsupported by testing data. At all.
I won't be using it again this season.

Things *you* can do to exert some control:
🟠Ensure you're fully vaccinated - boosted for #COVID19 and vaccinated for #flu
🟠Wear a good mask, properly (yes, cover your nose & use the nose wire to seal it up)
🟠These are airborne viruses-stale indoor air is a big risk