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Early in the pandemic, then-President Donald Trump claimed that COVID-19 was “like the flu,” despite the consensus among top fitness officials that COVID was at least several times more deadly than the flu. Three years later, it turns out that many Americans now percentage this sentiment, with a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll revealing that 41% of Americans think the flu is roughly equal to or more severe than COVID.
The survey, which included a nationally representative pattern of 1,636 U. S. adults and was conducted Sept. 14-18, asked participants how COVID-19 compares to the flu. The survey found that 41% think “COVID is more serious,” while 34% said COVID and flu are “pretty much the same” and 7% said the flu is “more serious. “The survey also found that 18% were unsure.
More than a quarter of Americans (27%) COVID is comparable to a cold, but more than a quarter of Americans (55%) said COVID is “more serious” than a cold.
At first, COVID and the flu may seem similar.
Both are contagious respiratory illnesses: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the flu and COVID are “contagious respiratory viruses,” but they are caused by other viruses. COVID is caused by infection with a coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) first known. in 2019, while influenza is caused through infection with a flu virus and is transmitted through person-to-person contact, basically through respiratory droplets.
COVID and flu present some symptoms: “Both can cause upper respiratory tract symptoms, as well as decrease respiratory tract symptoms, adding pneumonia. And in that sense, they’re very similar,” said Dr. Dean Winslow, a professor of infectious diseases at Stanford. Bethany DiPrete, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the University of North Carolina, also notes that at first, the symptoms of both can be difficult to distinguish from each other. “If you have a fever, cough, chills, fatigue, sore throat, it’s very complicated at the beginning of the acute phase, whether you have COVID or the flu,” he told Yahoo Life.
Despite some similarities, there are many differences between the two respiratory infections.
How they spread: COVID-19 spreads more easily than the flu, according to the CDC. “COVID is much more contagious than the flu and people tend to remain contagious, so they can spread it to others for longer. “of time,” adds DiPrete.
Likelihood of severe illness: The CDC also notes that while COVID and flu can cause severe illness, in general, COVID appears to cause more severe illness in some people. “At the population level, I would say COVID is more severe and the numbers show that. that,” DiPrete says. We’re seeing more hospitalizations and deaths, and the fact is, it can also happen if you’re perfectly healthy. While the flu also causes peak death rates, COVID tends to lead to more severe illness.
Mortality rate: During the 2022-2023 fall and winter season, a review of fitness knowledge from the Department of Veterans Affairs found that being hospitalized for COVID was linked to an increased risk of death compared to a flu hospitalization. To put this in context, the study authors noted that there were “2 to 3 times more people hospitalized for COVID” than for influenza in the United States at that time. But the study authors also noted that the difference in death rates between COVID-19 and influenza “appears to have decreased since the beginning of the pandemic. “A maximum likely explanation for why the number of fatal COVID cases was so high in 2020 and 2021, Winslow says, is that much of the population did not yet have immunity to the new virus. to vaccines or to a past infection. However, he says it’s too early to compare recent peak COVID death rates to this flu season, which runs from October to March or so.
The Yahoo News/YouGov vote also found that public opinion on COVID and flu differed by political affiliation.
Half of Republicans (51%) COVID and flu are about the same, compared to 22% of Democrats. The vote found that 63% of Democrats, versus 23% of Republicans, said COVID is more serious than the flu, and 5% of Democrats and 9% of Republicans said the flu is more serious. Republicans were also more likely than Democrats to compare COVID to a cold, with 44% of Republicans and only 14% of Democrats saying they were about the same.
The politicization of COVID-19 and the vaccine is nothing new, and some studies appear to have led to a higher excess death rate among registered Republicans. A survey conducted during the pandemic found that the political chasm can grow beyond COVID and that partisanship. Emotions toward science in general have changed over time: The 2021 Gallup poll found that “Republicans today are far less likely than their predecessors in 1975 to have confidence in science,” while Democrats today are more confident in science than those in the ’70s.
“I find it sad that concepts about science and politics have become so politicized,” Winslow says. “When I was a kid, Republicans were the party of science. Nixon quadrupled NIH funding, created the Environmental Protection Agency, the Endangered Species Act, and there was no such political department on science.
As fall and winter approaches, DiPrete recommends that Republicans and Democrats get vaccinated against COVID and the flu.
“They can cause serious illness,” he says. COVID is still incredibly serious and will have to be taken seriously, regardless of affiliation. “
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