<
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/jan/08/flu-super-k-australia-highly-infectious-strain>
"More than 2,500 Australians have rung in the new year with a highly
transmissible new strain of influenza, and health authorities are on alert for
what could be Australia’s worst year since tracking began 35 years ago.
Last year’s record, when more than half a million Australians contracted a
laboratory-certified form of flu and 1,508 people died, was a 44% increase on
the 2024 mortality rate.
The unseasonably high rate of infection for just the first week of January has
been driven by a mutation of Influenza A H3N2 known as subclade K – now
colloquially referred to as Super-K – first identified in September by
scientists at Melbourne’s Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity.
But health authorities said there was nothing to indicate an increase in
disease severity. Rather, genetic changes had allowed the strain to spread
rapidly, even as vaccines continued to protect against severe illness.
Super-K has now spread to more than 30 other countries.
According to data from the National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System, 284
influenza infections in Australia over the past seven days had occurred in
children aged four and younger.
Prof Ian Barr, the deputy director of the World Health Organization
Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza, told
Guardian
Australia that genetic mapping suggested Super-K originated in insignificant
numbers in the US in mid-2025.
The strain began appearing in Australia in August. By October it had taken hold
and by mid-November weekly emergency department presentations for
influenza-like illness had spiked to more than 370 people in New South Wales
alone, according to data from NSW Health.
More than one-third of Australia’s cases had been reported in NSW in the past
seven days.
And, as most people who contract the flu do not get tested, that figure may be
a small proportion of the population infected, the state health minister, Ryan
Park, said."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
