Flu Attack, Hits Elderly Hardest Nationwide

The flu's back and in full swing.

Though it's statistically beginning to wane nationally, the rate that it's knocking our seniors is growing higher and higher according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention flu expert, with H3N2 the predominant virus of the three main flu strains.

Just this past week, the number of people older than 65 who died from a confirmed case of influenza has sky-rocketed to 116 per 100,000. "We've kept rates since 2005 and we have never seen a rate this high," said Michael Jhung, an epidemiologist at the CDC. "The highest we've ever seen it was 90 per 100,000."

Unfortunately Jhung is expecting those numbers to grow higher still, with some cases resulting in hospitalization and death following several weeks after a person's diagnoses.

"We've still got several weeks of the season yet, so it's going to be much worse" before it's over, Jhung said in an article from USA Today. "The deaths are still accumulating."

It's estimated that each year, between 3,000 and 49,000 Americans die from influenza-related causes, according to the CDC. This season alone, 45 children have died as a result of the flu and the numbers of adults who have died won't be available until the season ends.

As influenza, more commonly known as the flu, rages on, it's common knowledge that it's more dangerous to those over the age of 65, with H3N2 being the most prevalently dangerous flu strain.

"It has come out from under a rock and it's now dominant because there is a larger population of susceptible people," said William Schaffner, a professor of preventive Medicine at Vanderbilt University in Nashville.

For that reason, Jhung said it's not too late to get vaccinated. If people, especially the elderly, start to feel ill, they should contact their doctor quickly. Antiviral drugs, taken within 48 hours of the onset of the flu, are helpful in preventing complications and keeping people out of the hospital, he said.