IL: Flu Hitting Chicago Earlier and Harder This Season, Experts Say

[Shiloh]

Source: http://www.dnainfo.com/chicago/20130...#ixzz2H81XmGfC


Flu Hitting Chicago Earlier and Harder This Season, Experts Say
Updated January 5, 2013 11:12am
By Alisa Hauser, DNAinfo Reporter/Producer


CHICAGO ? The flu has hit the Windy City earlier than any time in the previous five years and it's showing no sign of letting up, as hospitalizations increase and reported cases of the highly contagious viral infection continue to climb.

"So far, it's just going up," Julie Morita, medical director for the Chicago Department of Public Health's immunization program, said of the number of cases in the city. "Typically the flu increases in January or later, but this is the earliest we've seen in at least the past five years..."

[jeffrey]

Re: IL: Flu Hitting Chicago Earlier and Harder This Season, Experts Say

So with all these posts, we are basically seeing what we see in a severe flu season but earlier and the media has hyped it to the maximum. With 300 plus children a day being seen, this seems unreal and not really that many deaths.

School starts back next week and within the next couple of weeks, we will truly see the full impact.

[Shiloh]

Re: IL: Flu Hitting Chicago Earlier and Harder This Season, Experts Say

Source: http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?sec...cal&id=8945650

Outbreak has ER's full of flu patients
Monday, January 07, 2013
Ben Bradley

January 7, 2013 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- The flu outbreak is so widespread in Chicago that emergency rooms are full of patients seeking treatment.

Doctors are so busy ambulance drivers are told to bypass eight area hospitals if there's time to safely get their patient to another facility.

Northwestern Memorial Hospital is one of the hospitals where patients are being rerouted because the emergency rooms are too full...

... Thach brought her husband to Cook County Hospital. The emergency room there is seeing 50-to-70 suspected flu cases each day. That's on top of the hospital's nearly 400 regular daily ER visits. County continues to treat all patients.

But eight Chicago-area hospitals have been on bypass for at least part of the night because their emergency rooms are overwhelmed...