Flu Killed Close To 200 Children In The U.S. This Season

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NEW YORK (AP) - The flu killed more U.S. children in the past year than during any other regular flu season in recent history.

Health officials on Friday said they've received reports of 172 pediatric flu deaths since October. An average season sees about 110.

There were more deaths in 2009-2010, when a rare flu pandemic occurred involving a new strain. More than 300 children died that season.

The past flu season wasn't a pandemic, but it was an unusually long and intense one. It was driven by a kind of flu that tends to put more people in the hospital and cause more deaths, particularly young children and the elderly.

Making a bad year worse, the flu vaccine didn't work very well.

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