i think a lot of deaths were flu but counted as covid- odd that the flu should just disappear for 2 years while covid is around-
Flu hasn’t “disappeared” this season. There are even a few hotspots.
That said, Flu cases are low nationally, but, we’ve seen how more infectious variants of COVID drive out less infectious versions of COVID.
I would also observe that flu spread behaves rather differently than COVID. Flu is most infectious when one is feeling pretty bad. COVID is exceedingly infectious before one is feeling bad, and therefor one infected is much more likely to be out effectively spreading COVID, than if they got the Flu.
Further, modest mitigation slows down flu spread a lot more than it slows down the much more infections COVID (even “original” COVID.
And, speaking of behavior, human behavior is likely the biggest factor of all. Pre-COVID, most people with a sniffle would go about their activities. Now, most people DON’T. Case in point: When Omicron cases really started spiking high here (Mid-South USA, quite conservative area), attendance at my wife’s fairly large church plummeted. I mean, it REALLY plummeted. Attendance for a couple weeks there was 50% at best. Asking around, most of those missing were either ill or at a minimum had tested COVID-positive and / or had an immediate family member or close contact ill or positive. N95’s were the most numerous I’ve seen so far, esp. among parishioners over age 50 or so. Social distancing was kind of automatic, given all the empty seating space available. That kind of thing alone knocks back flu a lot.