Summer flu surge likely due to new variant, doctors warned
The infection count for October-December is already four times higher than it was last year.
A new influenza variant is driving an unusual summer spike of infections, doctors have been warned.
The Australian Health Protection Committee (AHPC) is urging doctors to prepare for health system strain during the holidays, even as a record-breaking year of cases comes to a close.
Influenza notifications for October-December 2025 are already beating the last two years, according to data from the National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System.
The fortnight from 10 November to 23 November included 17,678 notifications compared with 2801 in 2024.
