Epidemic (human)

Hundreds more people have been admitted to Welsh hospitals with flu as the infection spreads across the country and hospitals remain under huge pressure in Wales. The health service is dealing with an onslaught of different viruses which are seeing people admitted to wards and critical care, with many hospitals creaking at the seams.
Wales and the rest of the UK are dealing with three different flu viruses, along with RSV — respiratory syncytial virus, a common cause of coughs and colds — and Covid-19. The large number of people being admitted has seen ambulances queued up outside hospitals unable to offload their patients due to beds being full.
Earlier this month 15 ambulances were pictured outside Glangwili Hospital in Carmarthen with one person reportedly spending 10 hours inside one of the vehicles rather than receiving treatment inside the building. The health board said the hospital was operating under significant pressure, but there have been similar scenes outside other Welsh hospitals.
And at the end of 2024, on December 30, the Welsh Ambulance Service declared a 'critical incident', saying at the time that there were more than 340 calls waiting to be answered and that more than half of the Trust’s ambulance vehicles were stuck waiting to hand over patients outside hospitals. The critical incident was stood down on January 1. Welsh Health secretary Jeremy Miles said recently that, despite "significant planning", there had been higher flu levels than expected.
There have been similar issues in England with a number of NHS trusts declaring their own critical incidents, people waiting 50 hours to be admitted to a ward, and patients being asked to attend A&E on their own to avoid overcrowding.

The picture in Wales:
A Public Health Wales report for the first week of 2025, ending January 5, states that flu season is "approaching peak levels". The agency describes influenza activity as being at "medium levels" but "increasing". Some 281 patients were hospitalised with flu in the seven days period Wales' total number of hospital inpatients with flu during that week was 628, and 45 of those were in critical care. That meant a rise from the previous week when 574 patients were in hospital with flu and 38 of them were in critical care.
Public Health Wales also reports 60 hospital admissions for RSV — respiratory syncytial virus, a common cause of coughs and colds — during the week, along with 33 admissions for Covid-19. Of the total 164 people in hospital for RSV, five were in critical care, and of the 176 in hospital for Covid-19, one was in critical care.
The report continued: "The RSV season has peaked and is now decreasing, with activity in children now at medium intensity." It added that Covid-19 levels were "broadly stable and at lower levels than previously".