After two years of extraordinarily light flu seasons, which infectious disease experts attributed to Covid-19 pandemic precautions like social distancing and masking, influenza came roaring back, hitting early and hard.
Then respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, which had been showing up at odd times during the year, surged to new heights over the winter months. It was one of the worst RSV seasons many doctors said they could remember.
On top of all that, there was an increase in Covid-19 cases, which almost seemed old hat after three years of wave after wave. The bivalent Covid-19 booster arrived just in time to defend against the BA.5 subvariant, but only 17% of Americans wound up getting the updated vaccine, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.