How flu overtook COVID as Australia’s deadliest respiratory virus

By Adrian Esterman, Professor of Biostatistics and Epidemiology, Adelaide University

Many Australians have stopped worrying about respiratory viruses. The pandemic has passed and attention has shifted. COVID no longer dominates the headlines, and influenza is often dismissed as a routine winter illness.

But the latest provisional figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) suggest otherwise.

In 2025, there were 1,455 deaths in Australia due to influenza. This is the highest number the ABS has recorded in…

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