Flu virus stays in U.S.while health care systems are stressed by COVID-19 and breathing sicknesses.

The flu virus is still around in the United States, and in some parts of the country, it's even getting worse after it looked like it was going down everywhere. The CDC found that fewer people are going to the hospital for the flu, but more states are seeing a lot of sick people with flu and other breathing problems. While some areas in the Southeast and the West Coast are seeing fewer sick people, the Midwest is dealing with more flu cases and some places are even seeing a comeback of the virus. Last week, 23 states had a lot of flu cases, which is more than the week before.

Flu season in the U.S. usually has the most people getting sick between December and February. This year, the worst seemed to be in late December, but sometimes a second wave of flu happens, which can be smaller or bigger than the first one.

So far, the flu season seems about normal. The CDC guessed that since October, there have been at least 22 million people sick, 250,000 in the hospital, and 15,000 deaths from the flu with 74 of them being kids.

COVID-19, another virus, seems to have gotten worse at the same time as the flu did. But, even though more people are going to the hospital with COVID-19 than with the flu, it's not as bad as the last three winters were.

At the University of North Carolina, an expert said that about a month ago, the hospital was really full, with over 100 beds taken by people with COVID-19, flu, or RSV. Now, it's gotten a bit better, but COVID-19 is still the main reason people are in the hospital, and things are busier than they were before the pandemic because of COVID-19.