Pinellas Flu Outbreak - Dr Eric Shamas Orl Health Bayfront

Pinellas is among Florida counties seeing a spike in flu cases as the season nears peak. We speak with Dr. Eric Shamas, an emergency room physician at Orlando Health Bayfront Hospital in St. Petersburg. 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Gordon Bird Beyond the News. According to numbers from the
State Health Department, we are dealing with a flu outbreak
in many parts of Florida, not a surprise this time
of year. The surveillance data seems to show a positive
rate for January, or at least mid January, more than
double the equivalent numbers from November, and Pinellas is one

(00:22):
of the areas that appears that may be affected. So
we decided to get an expert on the phone. We
have doctor Eric Seamus, an emergency room physician at Orlando
Health Bayfront Hospital which is in Saint Petersburg, on the
line to explain what's going on. Doctor Seamus, welcome to
Beyond the News.

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Thank you very much for having me.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Gordon, Well, first of all, if you could kind of
give us the view from thirty thousand feet here. Where
are we seeing this flu outbreak in Florida?

Speaker 2 (00:47):
You know, outbreak is a very scary term, and really
what we're seeing from a thirty thousand foot view is
we are just in the full force of our flu season.
There are going to be pockets where you have more
positive cases, and at this point it looks like Pinellus
might be one of those locations. But right now, what
we're seeing is the time of year when you have

(01:09):
more flu cases and more people affected by the flu.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
And what are you seeing. Does your experience at Bayfront
line up with that as far as a kind of
a spike in positives and something, is it a long
way out of the norm?

Speaker 2 (01:26):
I would say that we are having a fairly typical
flu season. We are certainly seeing as you would expect
this time of year to reach the height of positive cases.
You know, from a community emergency department perspective, what we're
seeing is we're seeing a lot of patients who are
coming in with really bothersome symptoms of fevers, congestion, body aches.

(01:50):
You know, they feel terrible. The flu makes you feel terrible,
there's no doubt about it. And we're seeing a lot
of patients that are coming in with those symptoms and
unsurprisingly a lot of them are positive for influenza.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
And are there factors that may be influencing this rise
in this particular season. Of course, we know it's flu
season and that's obvious, but for example, recently we've had
whether that's a little colder than the norm in January,
is that also playing a role. Maybe by driving people indoors.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Yes, I think you've touched on a big factor. Upper
respiratory infections like influenza, you can get them year round,
but there is always a season where there's just an
increase in the number of cases, and that's the winter season. Now.
That is driven by a variety of factors, but one
of the biggest factors is that these are viruses that

(02:44):
are shared by being around people coughing, sneezing, and that way,
one person infects another. This year, we've had very cold temperatures,
most notably just in the past few weeks. That's driven
people indoors. We've been around each other in close proximity,
we've been around our families, we've been indoors at work,
and unsurprisingly that has probably caused an uptick in the

(03:08):
number of positive flu cases.

Speaker 1 (03:11):
What do people need to be What precautions do people
need to be taking at this time of year. They
don't want to be hopefully avoid a flu outbreak and
hopefully not be one of the cases.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
You know, I tell my patients all the time that
we need to do all the things our grandmother would
tell us to do. You need to wash your hands,
you need to make sure that you're keeping your hands
wash so that we're not spreading the virus to other people.
We need to cover our mouths when we cough, and
then if we are having fevers and symptoms, we just
need to be cognizant of that when we're around other people,

(03:45):
so that we're not spreading the virus to other people.
If you're not feeling well, for most people who don't
have risk factors for severe disease, and I'll go over
what that means. For most people, that means you need
to rest, you need to take a staminifin in ibuprofen.
If you can take those medications for fever and for

(04:06):
body aches, you need to have some chicken soup and
rest and let the body recover.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
What exactly, and just to kind of wrap up here,
what do we define as flu season. I always was
under the impression that maybe it was a little longer,
a little bit different here from the rest of the country,
simply because we have so many people coming down here
in the spring and coming in from all parts of
the country, and that that kind of tends to keep
the virus in circulation a little longer for us.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
Well, let me give you a little look behind the
curt and now that we have such easy access to
viral testing for things like COVID and for flu, it
almost seems as if the quote unquote season doesn't go
away because we can test for it very easily, we
get results back very quickly. In year round, we're having

(04:55):
positive flu in COVID and RSV and other virus. But
the season, as you mentioned, is really in the late
fall and into the winter when we have a time
of year when we just have more cases. For example,
we're hitting the peak of the season. What that means

(05:18):
on the ground is that we're seeing just in the
past two weeks, we've gone from a nine percent positivity
rate in our flu tests to a twenty three percent
positivity rate, And what that means for the community is
that we're testing very frequently and more patients are coming
in with symptoms, and we're starting to see that more

(05:39):
of those people are positive for flu as opposed to
any of the other unnamed viruses that cause colds. So
the season is really just the time of year late
fall through the winter when we're having an increase in
upper respiratory infections and one of the viruses that predominates
is influenza.

Speaker 1 (05:59):
We'll covering all these topics. Just just just listening to
the conversation makes me want to reach for the hand sanitizer,
but you know, we will all try to do our
best to keep as well as we possibly can. Doctor
Eric Seamus, an emergency room physician at Orlando Health Bayfront
Hospital in Saint Petersburg, thank you very much for joining
us on beyond the News.