'We're just bombarded with illness': Prairies see highest rates of positive flu tests in Canada

A daycare operator in Regina says the current flu season has been even worse than when "we were in full COVID." 

"People were isolating at that time and whatnot, but now everyone is back," said Megan Schmidt, director of First Years Learning Center.

"It just seems that everybody is catching everything. I don't think there's anybody that hasn't been touched by the flu," Schmidt said.

Pandemic precautions prevented the spread of COVID and respiratory viruses for almost three years. Influenza levels were exceptionally low nationally until early 2022, and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) infection rates were close to zero for months.

But now Canada is facing a triple virus threat as COVID-19, flu and RSV continue to spread.

Prairie provinces have the worst rates of positive flu tests, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada's FluWatch report from Nov. 6 to Nov. 12. Almost a third of tests came back positive (28 per cent). 

Adam Ogieglo, a family physician in Saskatoon, is not surprised by the high positivity rates. 

"I think over the last two or three weeks essentially every swab I've done apart from one has come back positive for influenza A. So we are definitely seeing those stats born out in real-time in our clinic."

He said people seeking help at the urgent clinic care are waiting four or five hours to see a physician or being turned away altogether toward the end of the day. 

"People are having trouble accessing care and we're just bombarded with illness," he said. 

Dr. Lynora Saxinger, an infectious diseases specialist at the University of Alberta, says western provinces normally get an earlier flu season than the rest of Canada because school starts sooner and the climate is drier. 

"Once it gets introduced into a region, they start to experience their epidemic," she said.

But since many people managed to avoid getting sick the past few years, Saxinger and other experts say people's immunity has waned. 

"What we have is a population that really doesn't have much of an immunity from partial exposure to influenza or partial immunity from more recent vaccination, so it's a bit more of an aggressive uptick because people are that much more susceptible," Saxinger said.