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Is it COVID-19 or flu 2024? With both viruses posing health concerns and similar symptoms, we offer insights into how you and your family can navigate this winter season with informed choices.

 

Similarities in COVID vs. flu symptoms 

Both COVID-19 and flu can cause varying degrees of symptoms. You may experience no symptoms (called asymptomatic cases) or you could develop severe symptoms.

Symptoms both illnesses commonly share include:

• Fever or feeling feverish/chills
• Cough
• Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
• Fatigue (tiredness)
• Sore throat
• Runny or stuffy nose
• Muscle pain or body aches
• Headache
• Vomiting and diarrhea (most common in children)

In addition, both COVID-19 and the flu can result in pneumonia, a secondary infection that inflames the air sacs in one or both of your lungs.

 

COVID is like the flu and here to stay

“COVID is not over, I don’t know if it will ever be totally over. The pandemic is over, but it is probably an endemic virus now,” says David Chansolme, M.D., medical director of infection prevention at INTEGRIS Health. “It’s going to continue circulating from time to time just like influenza (flu).”
That’s in part due to variants and mutations. There are five vaccines that can provide immunity against COVID-19. The vaccines help the immune system recognize and fight the virus, reducing the likelihood of infection. As a result, they lower the risk of severe illness, hospitalization and death.

 

A look at the 2024 flu season

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) predicts the respiratory season (flu, COVID and RSV) will be similar or slightly improved (in terms of hospitalizations) compared to 2023-24. During last year’s flu season, an estimated 44,900 died from flu complications.

Flu activity in the Southern Hemisphere, primarily influenza A (H3N2), is consistent with previous seasons.

• Health experts use this information – the Southern Hemisphere has its winter and the flu season during summer in America – to preview circulating flu strains and their impact.
• Based on this information, vaccine manufacturers can tailor vaccines to provide the best possible protection against the most common and impactful strains.

For the 2024-25 flu season, the CDC announced recommendations that all U.S. flu vaccines be trivalent vaccines. Trivalent vaccines include three strains to increase exposure to different types of flu viruses. This year, the vaccine includes influenza A(H1N1), A(H3N2) and B/Victoria-lineage. Previous years of the vaccine included four components (quadrivalent) to account for an additional type of influenza B.

Both COVID and the flu can be deadly, especially among immunocompromised individuals and people 65 years and up. Chansolme encourages everyone to get vaccinated for both the flu and COVID to help protect those more vulnerable to both illnesses. And if you get sick, he stresses the importance of ruling out COVID, as there may be additional treatment options available.

For more specific information on which COVID or flu vaccine is right for you, INTEGRIS Health encourages you to contact your primary care physician.