As of late December, flu activity was highest in South Carolina and lowest in Vermont, CDC data shows.
The CDC defines influenza-like illness, or ILI, as a fever of 100 degrees or greater, along with a cough and/or sore throat. The agency collects data on outpatient visits to healthcare providers for respiratory illness through ILINet. ILI percentages are weighted for state population and compared to baseline levels to assess flu activity. For more information on how the metric is calculated, click here.
Hospitals reported 20,066 new flu admissions in the week ending Dec. 30, up from 14,789 the week prior, according to the CDC's latest FluView report. About 6.9% of outpatient visits involved patients with respiratory illness. This metric sits above the baseline of 2.9% and is up from 6.31% the week prior.
Here is how each state and Washington, D.C., stacked up with the percentage of ILI visits:
Note: The list includes two instances of states with the same percentage.
- South Carolina — 19.32
- Louisiana — 13.58
- New Mexico — 13.48
- Tennessee — 13.4
- Georgia — 11.06
- Wyoming — 10.99
- Alabama — 10.04
- Mississippi — 9.59
- District of Columbia — 9.16
- New Jersey — 8.82
- North Carolina — 8.65
- Colorado — 8.43
- California — 7.75
Virginia — 7.75 - Texas — 7.37
- North Dakota — 7.28
- Florida — 6.86
- Ohio — 6.85
- Nevada — 6.49
- Maryland — 6.2
- Idaho — 6.15
- Arizona — 6
- Massachusetts — 5.94
- Arkansas — 5.87
- Kentucky — 5.79
- Montana — 5.1
- Connecticut — 5.01
- Utah — 4.91
- Michigan — 4.89
- Indiana — 4.63
- Hawaii — 4.6
- New York — 4.21
- Pennsylvania — 4.17
- New Hampshire — 4.14
- West Virginia — 4.13
- Illinois — 3.96
- Washington — 3.92
- Wisconsin — 3.5
- Kansas — 3.46
Nebraska — 3.46 - Maine — 3.45
- Rhode Island — 3.4
- Alaska — 3.17
- Iowa — 2.99
- Missouri — 2.95
- South Dakota — 2.89
- Delaware — 2.71
- Oklahoma — 2.59
- Oregon — 2.32
- Minnesota — 2.13
- Vermont — 2.11