NHS England is calling it a ‘super flu’, which is in fact its own phrase rather than anything scientific.

It is severe, there is no doubt about that, and it has mutated.

Not least because the NHS’ own figures show an average of 2,600 patients a day were in a hospital bed last week – up 55 per cent on the week before.

That is enough, it said, to fill three NHS trust hospitals.

The problem is the flu has come early this season and it has mutated, although the UK Health Security Agency insists the current vaccine is still effective.

Nevertheless, it takes little to tip the NHS over these days and yet more figures from NHS England reveal that A&E attendances last month were a record 2.35 million. And there were more than 800,000 ambulance calls – nearly 49,000 more than November 2024.

Wh

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