10000 flu deaths in UK

[jamieoliverfan]

I just saw Sally Ann Davies on the news, I remember hearing her last week on the radio saying that last year there were in the UK 10000 flu deaths the reporter questioned her on that and she confirmed that this was really the case. Given that the UK has approx 55 million people that would mean 10000/55000000=1/5500 That would mean that 1 in 5500 UK inhabitants died as a result of flu. Surely this cannot be true? How reliable is what she tells us, is she new in the job? Does anybody know her background? If we are going to have a flu epidemic we are going to see a lot of her, so it would be good to know whether she comes with reliable information.

Sheesh, you could google for yourself to check on the accuracy of the figure.

About 3500 per year says patient.co.uk.
True figure anywhere between 3k and 12k, discused on JABS.

So 5k/annum isn't implausible.

between 3-12,000 is normal. 1999 was a particularly bad year when est 22,000 people died. That is why I have difficulty working out why they are publishing 10 deaths in a week from flu when this many die normally.

thank you all - that helps putting the figures in perspective.