New Flu Mutation Causes Severe Illness: See Latest NJ Data

Close gatherings over the Thanksgiving holiday could cause an uptick in emergency room visits in New Jersey due to a trio of respiratory illnesses that typically rise this time of year, as well as a new mutation of the common flu that doesn’t respond to this year’s flu shot.

New Jersey emergency rooms typically see an increase in COVID-19, influenza and RSV rates during the holidays. This year’s flu season could be more serious due to a new Influenza H3N2 mutation known as “subclade K,” which is spreading in North America, including the United States.

Although the current flu vaccine offers protection against the H3N2 strain, it doesn’t cover subclade K, which hadn’t been identified when the vaccine was developed. The variant has mutated seven times, making H3N2 an even more serious threat, according to experts.

“Knowing that there’s a new mutated strain out there and H3N2 generally causes more severe disease is concerning,” Dr. Robert Hopkins Jr., medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, told NBC’s “Today” show.

The symptoms of the new strain are similar to those caused by common influenza, including fever, chills, body aches, headaches, extreme fatigue, congestion or runny nose, and coughing.

The symptoms come on suddenly. “It’s that hit-by-a-truck feeling,” Hopkins told “Today.”

Even with the new mutated strain, the New Jersey Department of Health(NJDOH) continues to encourage residents to get their COVID-19 and flu vaccines.

"Vaccines continue to be our best defense at reducing severe illness or hospitalization from COVID-19 and the flu," said NJDOH Acting Commissioner Jeff Brown.

As a result, NJDOH is partnering with health systems in the state and launching regional COVID-19 and flu vaccine clinics to increase access to vaccines for residents.

"With respiratory virus season upon us and the holidays around the corner, there’s no better time than now to get vaccinated and be protected," said Brown. "By partnering with leading health systems in all regions of the state, we are making sure that families have direct, convenient, and reliable access to vaccines close to home."

This particular mutation is now dominant in many countries, including Japan, the United Kingdom and Canada, Forbes reported.

The CDC currently lists Influenza A H3N2 as the cause of most flu cases in the United States. The extent of the spread of the subclade K mutation in the United States because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention didn’t do any tracking for its FluView report during the recent government shutdown.

The latest data from the CDC, last updated on Nov. 19, shows that acute respiratory illness rates overall are low in New Jersey.

As of Nov. 15, 0.5 percent of residents went to an emergency room for influenza in New Jersey. The number of emergency room visits for influenza tends to grow in December until it spikes in February. Last February, 9.7 percent of residents went to an emergency room for influenza in New Jersey

The CDC uses data from emergency department visits to model epidemic trends. The epidemic trend for COVID-19 has not changed as emergency room visits remain very low.

While emergency room visits remain low for influenza and RSV, both are seeing a growing epidemic trend.

Nationwide, acute respiratory illnesses remain at low or very low levels, according to the CDC; however, emergency room visits for RSV are increasing in many states in the South and Southeast. COVID-19 activity remains low, and seasonal flu activity is low nationally but increasing, according to the surveillance report.

Wastewater surveillance reports from 20 monitoring sites will provide a clearer picture of COVID, flu and RSV rates in New Jersey when the data is updated Friday.

On Nov. 15, it showed the viral activity for COVID, flu, and RSV remains very low.