The Mississippi State Department of Health on Thursday reported the first confirmed case of influenza for the 2016-2017 flu season.
The patient is from central Mississippi, the Health Department said in a statement.
The case was detected through the agency’s influenza surveillance system, a part of which identifies representative flu cases across the state. Healthcare providers also do their own flu testing.
“This not only indicates that flu is present in the state, but it also serves as a reminder that now is the time to get your flu shot if you haven’t done so already,” State Epidemiologist Dr. Paul Byers said in the statement. “The flu shot takes one to two weeks to produce immunity, and flu season usually peaks in January through March in Mississippi.”
Nationwide, an estimated 3,000-49,000 people die and more than 200,000 are hospitalized each year because of the flu.
“We do encourage all Mississippians six months and older to get vaccinated,” Byers said. “Those particularly at risk for influenza complications include young children, adults 65 and older, pregnant women, and those with chronic illnesses.”
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
Republish this article
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
- Look for the "Republish This Story" button underneath each story. To republish online, simply click the button, copy the html code and paste into your Content Management System (CMS).
- Editorial cartoons and photo essays are not included under the Creative Commons license and therefore do not have the "Republish This Story" button option. To learn more about our cartoon syndication services, click here.
- You can’t edit our stories, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style.
- You can’t sell or syndicate our stories.
- Any web site our stories appear on must include a contact for your organization.
- If you share our stories on social media, please tag us in your posts using @MSTODAYnews on Facebook and @MSTODAYnews on Twitter.
- You have to credit Mississippi Today. We prefer “Author Name, Mississippi Today” in the byline. If you’re not able to add the byline, please include a line at the top of the story that reads: “This story was originally published by Mississippi Today” and include our website, mississippitoday.org.
- You can’t edit our stories, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style.
- You cannot republish our editorial cartoons, photographs, illustrations or graphics without specific permission (contact our managing editor Kayleigh Skinner for more information). To learn more about our cartoon syndication services, click here.
- Our stories may appear on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories.
- You can’t sell or syndicate our stories.
- You can only publish select stories individually — not as a collection.
- Any web site our stories appear on must include a contact for your organization.
- If you share our stories on social media, please tag us in your posts using @MSTODAYnews on Facebook and @MSTODAYnews on Twitter.