national COVID-19 trends

The COVID-19 trends surprised me this week: several major national metrics are trending down, despite not yet reaching high levels comparable to what we typically see at the peaks of surges. This could be good news, but tread with caution; these data are preliminary, and SARS-CoV-2 is an unpredictable virus.

Our record-high flu season may have peaked in the U.S. as of early January, but levels of that disease remain very high while COVID-19 rates continue to increase across most of the country. This winter is shaping up to be a long one for airborne virus spread.

COVID-19 levels are increasing across most of the U.S. as of late December. But the flu is overshadowing COVID-19 in healthcare system impacts and headlines: flu is having a record season, driven by a variant called H3N2.

COVID-19 spread continues to increase across the U.S. as we head into the most travel-and-gathering-heavy part of the year. Flu levels are also going up, more aggressively than COVID-19. The holidays often come with delays in infectious disease data updates, so keep in mind that COVID-19, as well as flu and other pathogens, may be…

After a couple of weeks of uneven increases, COVID-19 spread is now clearly going up in the U.S. across most major metrics and most regions. Since the latest data are from early December, COVID-19 levels are likely much higher now in many places.

COVID-19 trends for the last week of November are similar to the rest of the month: disease levels are increasing in the Midwest and Northeast, but less so in the West and South. Our latest data include the Thanksgiving holiday, but not the full extent of outbreaks that followed it. Meanwhile, flu spread is accelerating…