Economy 27 April 2023, 3:45pm

Influenza epidemic keeps improving in Hungary

Portfolio

Fewer people sought medical help with respiratory illnesses and influenza-like symptoms over the past seven days compared to the preceding week, according to the latest report of the National Centre for Public Health (NNK) published on Thursday. There were 50% fewer visits relating to SARI and 80% fewer complaints about the flu than eight weeks ago, at the height of the epidemic.

First, the key COVID-19 stats

Before going into flu data, let's take a look at the latest developments on the coronavirus front!

The key data for the last four weeks are in the table below. Frankly, it's makes no sense to talk at length about the spread of COVID-19 in Hungary at this point. As you can see, even an apparently alarming leap in the number of hospitalised and ventilated coronavirus patients does not mean a thing - only inaccurate data, a fluke.

The three graphs below provide further information about the spread of coronavirus and its severity.

What about the flu epidemic?

The NNK said that on the 16th week of the year, 148,700 people went to the doctor with symptoms of severe acute respiratory infections (down from 149,200 a week earlier), of whom 12,900 (8.7%) were diagnosed with influenza-like illness, in contrast with 15,300 (10.3%) a week earlier.

If it were not for the holiday season when people are less inclined to visit the GP's office and complain about "just a wee cough", we would not see that dip towards end-2022 in the lines below.

Here's another chart attesting the peak in the epidemic was left behind two months ago.

The SARI figure per 100,000 population shows practically no change (-0.3%), versus a 3.5% drop a week ago and a 23% decline a fortnight ago, and the number of flu-like symptoms has fallen by only about 16% (vs. nearly 18% a week ago and almost 38% a fortnight ago), yet the winding down of the flu season cannot be called into question.

A breakdown of the positive samples show the high prevalence of the flu, followed by SARS-CoV-2 and RSV. The graph shows percentages of cumulated data, with the x axis showing the weeks starting on the 40th week of 2022 up to the 16th week of 2023.

OF THE 38 RESPIRATORY SPECIMENS (DOWN SHARPLY down FROM 64 A WEEK AGO) SENT IN BY DOCTORS, 15 (39.5%) WERE FOUND TO BE INFLUENZA OF SOME TYPE, 2 (5.3%) WERE SARS-COV-2, AND ONE (2.6%) PATIENTS HAD RESPIRATORY syncytial VIRUS (RSV).

This compares with 29.7%, 17.2% and 1.6% the week before, respectively.

Last week, 140 people were hospitalised (184 on the preceding week) for severe acute respiratory infections, 19 of whom required intensive care (27 a week earlier). Of the 140 patients, 22.1% (31) were aged 2 years or younger (versus 20.7% or 38 a week ago) and 57.1% (80) were aged 60 years or older (versus 56.5% or 104 a week ago).

Of the patients requiring hospital care, 4 or 2.9% were affected by influenza (vs. 10 or 5.4% a week ago), 43 or 30.7% by SARS-CoV-2 (down from 65 or 35.3% a week ago) and 4 or 2.9% by respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) or respiratory giant cell infection (vs. 4 or 2.2% a week ago).

75% of RSV positive patients (3) were 2 years old or younger, while 93% (40) of people hospitalised with coronavirus infection were in the 60+ age group. The former figure shows no change from last week and the latter was nominally lower but up from 84.6% as a share of all RSV positive patients.

The age breakdown (see the four graphs below) shows that SARI affected primarily children, and to a smaller extent young adults since the 40th week of last year, while flu-like illnesses started to "pick on" children and young Hungarians from the fourth week of 2023.

As for people with flu-like symptoms having a doctor checking their health status, the share of those up to 14 years of age dropped, while the share of those in the 15-34 and 35-59 age groups rose from a week ago.

As we wrote above, there was practically no change in the number of those seeking medical help with SARI, and the graphs reflect this in an age group breakdown too.