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Week Ending November 23 (Week 47)

Every year, the Kane County Health Department (KCHD) tracks respiratory illness activity in Kane County from the beginning of October through the end of May. This report provides an overview of influenza, COVID-19, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Respiratory illness activity is tracked from a variety of data sources such as syndromic surveillance for emergency department visits, laboratory test positivity, intensive care unit (ICU) admissions, respiratory illness outbreaks in long-term care facilities, and influenza-like illness (ILI)1 absenteeism in Kane County schools. All data contained within this report are provisional and subject to change.



The Kane County Health Department thanks all surveillance partners for assisting with collecting and sharing this information.

Overview

Respiratory Illness Activity in Kane County is estimated to be LOW2:

  • 0.42% of all visits at Kane County emergency departments were for influenza.
  • 0.84% of all visits at Kane County emergency departments were for COVID-19.
  • 0.56% of all visits at Kane County emergency departments were for RSV.


No respiratory illness-related ICU admissions were reported to the health department; there have been 7 total for the season.


No pediatric deaths due to respiratory illnesses have been reported.


This season, no outbreaks of influenza have been reported in long-term care/assisted living facilities in Kane County.


A total of 57 of 1,818 (3.1%) specimens tested for respiratory viruses were positive at 3 Kane County labs:

  • 10 of 617 (1.6%) influenza tests were positive3.
  • 17 of 683 (2.5%) COVID-19 tests were positive.
  • 30 of 518 (5.8%) RSV tests were positive.


0.32% of Kane County public school students were absent due to ILI.

Emergency Department (ED) Visits

Influenza-like illness (ILI) is used as an indicator for overall respiratory illness activity.


Each week, data for the 2024-25 season will be presented with data from previous respiratory illness seasons to show the trend of ED visits for respiratory illness over time.


The baseline4 for ILI related emergency department visits in Kane County is 3.75% of all emergency department visits.


1.61% of hospital emergency department visits were for influenza-like illness.



Emergency department visits for ILI in Kane County had the following age distribution:

  • 0-4 years: 18.8%
  • 5-24 years: 34.8%
  • 25-49 years: 23.2%
  • 50-64 years: 8.7%
  • 65+ years: 14.5%

Influenza

0.42% of hospital emergency department visits were for influenza.



Emergency department visits for influenza in Kane County had the following age distribution:

  • 0-4 years: 11.1%
  • 5-24 years: 33.3%
  • 25-49 years: 38.9%
  • 50-64 years: 5.6%
  • 65+ years: 11.1%

COVID-19

0.84% of hospital emergency department visits were for COVID-19.


Emergency department visits for COVID-19 in Kane County had the following age distribution:

  • 0-4 years: 16.7%
  • 5-24 years: 16.7%
  • 25-49 years: 22.2%
  • 50-64 years: 5.6%
  • 65+ years: 38.9%

RSV

0.56% of hospital emergency department visits were for RSV.


Emergency department visits for RSV in Kane County had the following age distribution:

  • 0-4 years: 83.3%
  • 5-24 years: 8.3%
  • 25-49 years: 0.0%
  • 50-64 years: 0.0%
  • 65+ years: 8.3%

Laboratory Testing

Student Absenteeism

0.32% of students were absent from school due to ILI.


The Kane County Health Department received absenteeism reports from 72 public schools.

*School Absenteeism from March 2020 through May 2022 is not reported due to COVID-19

National Snapshot5

  • The activity levels compare the mean reported percent of visits due to ILI during the current week to the mean reported percent of visits due to ILI during non-influenza weeks. The 13 activity levels correspond to the number of standard deviations below, at, or above the mean for the current week compared with the mean during non-influenza weeks. 


  • This map uses the proportion of outpatient visits to healthcare providers for influenza-like illness to measure the ILI activity level within a state. It does not, however, measure the extent of geographic spread of flu within a state. Therefore, outbreaks occurring in a single city could cause the state to display high activity levels.


  • Data collected in ILINet may disproportionately represent certain populations within a state, and therefore may not accurately depict the full picture of influenza activity for the whole state.

1Influenza-like illness (ILI) is defined as fever ≥ 100°F with a cough and/or sore throat.

2Respiratory Activity is defined by: Low (0-4% of ED visits were for ILI), Moderate (4-7% of ED visits were for ILI), and High (7% or more of ED visits were for ILI).

3Rapid influenza testing cannot distinguish influenza infections caused by novel influenza A viruses. The sensitivity of this type of testing has been shown to range between 20-100% for seasonal influenza viruses. A negative result does not exclude influenza virus infection.

4Baseline for Emergency Department (ED) related visits was calculated using the mean percentage of visits and adding two standard deviations from 2018-19, select weeks in 2019-2020, 2021-22, 2022-23, and 2023-24 influenza season data for non-influenza weeks. Non-influenza weeks are defined as two or more consecutive weeks when each week accounts for less than 2% of the season’s total positive influenza specimens in Kane County labs. The baseline for ILI-related ED visits is used to determine levels (low, moderate, and high) of Respiratory Illness Activity.

5The National Snapshot comes directly from the FluView interactive portal prepared by the CDC Influenza Division using ILINet data. FluView can be accessed at https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/fluview/main.html.

Additional Resources

All weekly respiratory illness reports are available online at https://kanehealth.com/Pages/Resp%20Illness%20Surv.aspx.


CDC respiratory illness information can be found at https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/about/index.html.


National respiratory illness surveillance: https://www.cdc.gov/respiratory-viruses/data/activity-levels.html.


IDPH respiratory illness surveillance: https://dph.illinois.gov/topics-services/diseases-and-conditions/respiratory-disease/surveillance/respiratory-disease-report.html.


For additional information on respiratory illness surveillance, please contact the Kane County Health Department epidemiology team at kchdepi@kanecountyil.gov.

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