Flu season in Texas is
off to an early start this
year and right now we're not seeing
any signs of it slowing down,
Tarrant County Public Health says.
Texas is one of multiple states in the
country with very high levels of flu.
Our partners at the Star Telegram
say statewide nearly 8% of clinic
patients had flu like symptoms.
So patients are going
to the doctor for fever,
coughs and sore throats to protect yourself.
Experts say get the flu shot
and the updated COVID booster.
The flu shot is recommended for
anyone six months and older.
And of course,
wash your hands often,
cover your mouth when you cough and
stay home if you aren't feeling well.
From the flu to RSV to COVID,
a lot of people sick right now just
as we head into the holidays when
we're going to be seeing families.
So joining me to talk about it right now.
Doctor David Winter from Baylor
Scott and White Health.
Good morning,
doctor winter.
Good morning, Chris. Good to see you.
Yes, and so many things to worry about.
It seems right now let's start
with influenza. What's the latest?
How bad is this flu season gonna be?
Well, as you said,
there's lots of cases there
on the uptick right now.
In fact, the case are higher than
they've been in the last 10 years.
Lots of influenza out there.
So if you were about Thanksgiving
parties getting together,
you might want to take precautions.
You talked about the flu shot.
I believe in those.
Staying away from crowds is also a good idea.
I don't see many of these masks out
there now, but they still work.
You might want to be careful because
influence is out there as quick
to spread and it's going to be a
bad year for influenza coming up.
Chris might have to bring back
the mask, OK. We're also seeing.
Lots of RSV, or at least we've
talked about it lately, especially
with these children's hospitals.
Is it still packing those children's units?
Yes, it is. If you look nationwide,
about 75% of all Children's
Hospital beds are full.
Still, the new thing we've seen
is older folks are starting
to come down with this also.
So if you're older and you have impaired
lungs or hearts, if you're frail,
you need to be worried about this.
The RSV virus makes lots of secretions.
That's harder for older folks that are
sick and for young babies to clear.
That leads to bronchitis and pneumonia.
So RSV is still a problem right now.
And that old COVID virus?
It seems like we're not hearing
about it as much lately,
but it is still changing,
and there are new variants taking over.
So what is the status of
COVID in America right now?
Yeah, you can say bye to BA4BA5.
That was those were the dominant
variants this past year.
They're going away and the new kid
on the block is BBQ .1 BQ dot 1.1.
Both those variants, they're taking over.
They spread faster,
they're more contagious.
So far we're not seeing
a big surge with this.
We worry about that though,
because these things are going to
be out there and we're expecting
as the cold weather come in,
a big surge could happen with COVID.
OK,
so when talking about these new variants,
each one seems to have its
own set of characteristics.
Is it possible they could mess
up our holiday festivities?
Because this is the time of
year when people are traveling,
getting on airplanes and whatnot.
Yeah, I I do worry about that quite a bit.
Here's the big concern right now,
there's not a lot of COVID,
it's kind of steadily rolling along,
but we're afraid that it could get worse.
Here's the big concern.
If you look at people who've had COVID
within the last six months or had a
COVID shot within the last six months,
that's minority of folks.
So the majority of people actually
don't have that collective immunity.
So when this COVID,
these new variants start to take off,
they could take off rapidly.
So I'm very much concerned about that.
Chris, switching
gears a little bit, we're hearing
about new medications for weight loss.
Are these something that you
recommend at this point?
Yeah, this is really interesting.
I've had a lot of people
contact me about this.
The old weight loss pills
revved up your metabolism.
That makes you burn up more calories.
Also made you nervous, sweaty, anxious.
And when you stop those,
typically you'd gain back the weight or more.
These new medications work differently.
They actually slow the the stomach
from emptying, so when you eat,
you get full quicker and you don't
get hungry quicker after that.
The drugs are called Glucagon
peptide drugs or GLP drugs.
They're actually designed for diabetes.
But they also work in non
diabetics to slow down the cost,
slow down the empty of the
stomach and help you lose weight.
They've been very successful.
The problem is they're very
expensive and most of them
require a shot into the belly.
So some downsides about that.
You must have a prescription.
But if you worried about weight loss,
something new to talk to your doctor about.
All right,
we're all thinking about those extra
pounds during the holiday season.
Doctor David Winter, thank you
for joining us this midday.
Gonna be with you. Thank you, Chris.