Flu cases climb to highest levels in New York City in a decade

JOHN TAGGART/THE NEW YORK TIMES

A Rite Aid pharmacy in Manhattan, in October 2023. Preliminary data from hospitals across New York City indicates that more patients went to emergency rooms complaining of flu-like symptoms — such as fever and a cough — in the middle of December 2025 than during any other week in the past decade.

NEW YORK >> In New York City, the signs of flu abound: more people wearing masks, more people coughing on the subway. There has been a school closure. Families canceling plans. Sports fans have noticed absences. The Brooklyn Nets head coach, Jordi Fernández, missed a game because of flu. So did a New York Rangers assistant coach.

Preliminary data from hospitals across the city indicates that more patients went to emergency rooms complaining of flu-like symptoms — such as fever and a cough — in the week ending Dec. 20 than during any other week in the past decade.

New York City’s syndromic surveillance system, which collects information about every patient who visits an emergency room, reported 9,857 visits for “influenza-like illness” last week. That was higher than in the worst weeks of the 2017-18 or 2024-25 flu seasons, both ranked as “high severity” by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Laboratory tests for the flu — which include people who went to see a doctor, along with those who were hospitalized — underscored the vast reach of the virus. During the second week of December, New York City recorded 24,607 laboratory-reported cases of flu — more than during any week during the last flu season, which was particularly bad. More than half of those cases, 14,957, were in children.

This year’s flu season started early, with cases soaring about a month sooner than last year. In recent weeks, New York City and the surrounding area, as well as parts of Louisiana, have had among the highest levels of flu activity in the country, according to the CDC.

The dominant strain of the seasonal flu virus that is circulating, known as H3N2, has acquired mutations that could help it evade the body’s disease-fighting system. That could mean that the flu shot, which is designed to amp up the immune response, would not be as effective as in some other years. Still, some early data provides reassurance that people who receive the vaccine are less likely to require hospitalization if they become infected.

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The good news is that, in New York, at least, the flu this year doesn’t appear more likely to result in patients being hospitalized than normal, according to experts. “At this time, there’s no indication the current strain is more virulent than other strains,” said Cadence Acquaviva, a spokesperson for the New York State Health Department.

Dr. Frederick Davis of Long Island Jewish Medical Center, a large hospital on the border of Queens and Nassau counties, said he was struck by how many flu patients also had nausea, vomiting or diarrhea — more than usual, he thought.

“We are seeing a lot of GI symptoms with the flu,” said Davis, who is the executive vice chair of emergency medicine at Long Island Jewish.

Most patients who have needed to be hospitalized had underlying ailments, such as heart disease. Some older patients were being admitted because they seemed too weak and tired to send home, he said.

The surge in flu cases has left New York’s busy emergency rooms even more crowded than usual.

Normally, 250 patients might pass through the emergency room at Long Island Jewish in a day, Davis said. “We’re seeing 280 or 290 a day,” Davis said.

Public health experts said flu cases would likely increase in the days ahead.

“We haven’t hit the peak yet,” said Dr. Caitlin Rivers, an infectious-disease epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

© 2025 The New York Times Company

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