Hospitalised SARI patients at seasonal high in Hungary

Key findings:

• one third of the (rather few) samples tested on the 1st week of 2025 showed infection with some kind of influenza virus;
• the coronavirus positivity rate was 0%, but the share of SARS-CoV-2 in all samples tested remains high at 14.6% versus 5.4% for influenza;
• the number of people hospitalised with severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) was the highest yet in the current respiratory season;
• some 9% of those hospitalised tested positive for COVID-19, while there were already 84 people with influenza infection in hospital, i.e. 38.4% of all SARI patients;
• of the 220 people in hospital with SARI, 86 (39.1%) were aged two or younger, while 69 (31.4%) were 60 and above.

Lower numbers only reflect the holiday season

On the 1st week of 2025 (30 December-5 January), 137,300 people sought medical help with acute respiratory infections (ARI), including 19,900 people with flu-like symptoms, according to data released by the National Centre for Public Health and Pharmacy (NNGYK) on Thursday.

Note that both the 43rd and 44th weeks had only four working days due to national holidays, hence the fewer number of cases in the statistics and the dips in the graphs. The dataset for the 52nd week is full of holes, as the NNK published an abridged report with only some testing figures.) The respiratory season (often and erroneously referred to as 'flu season') generally peaks between the 4th and the 9th week of the year.

A short-term comparison (for the last three seasons of respiratory illnesses) shows that the number of patients with ARI was lower than in the 2022/23 respiratory season, while the number of patients with flu-like symptoms was lower than a year ago but a bit higher than two years ago.

The share of flu-like symptoms in ARI was up at 14.5% from 12.8% on the 51st week, exceeding the comparative readings from the past two seasons.

We also have data for ARIs and flu-like symptoms per 100,000 population, although a long-term data series is available only for the latter.

in terms ari per 100,000 people, the situation is currently better than one and two years ago, while in terms flu-like symptoms, it is better than last year but worse than two years ago.

In the graph below you can compare to the flu situation with the previous 13 respiratory seasons.

A total of 27 samples were tested on the 1st week (up from 17 a week earlier, but considerably down from 300 on the 51st week), none of which came back COVID-19 positive (down from 2 on the 52nd and 18 on the 51st week). This compares with a Covid positivity rate of over 28% a year ago (26 cases) and nearly 11% two years ago (9 cases).

The share of influenza (33.3%) in the tested samples is above the previous two years' respective prints, and it has even come down from over 47%, while that of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) remains lower than in 2022/23 but exceeds the figure for the first week of 2024.

The following graph may seem a bit fuzzy but at least it shows for a side-by side comparison the weekly positivity rates for influenza (green), Covid (orange), and RSV (blue) for the past three respiratory seasons up to the 1st week.

As regards the individual positivity rates in all the samples, the 'switch' never took place in the 2023/24 respiratory season (i.e. the total number of positive Covid tests in all samples tested remained higher than the number of positive flu tests) in and occurred by the end of the 3rd week in the 2022/23 season.

As the chart below attests, SARS-CoV-2 continues to be the main pathogen in samples, with 453 positive tests (14.6% of the 3,104 samples tested), followed by influenza (169), rhinovirus (44), RSV (14), parainfluenza (5), human metapneumovirus (HMPV, 4), and adenovirus (3).

220 people with severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) were hospitalised on the 1st week of 2025, of whom 26 (or 11.8%) required intensive care. The former figure is the highest so far in the current respiratory season, while the ICU/hospitalised ratio is the second highest after 12.8% on the 40th week. The respective figures for the 1st week of 2024 were 177 people in hospital, and 20 (11.3%) in ICUs.

Further breakdown shows that 20 people (9.1% of SARI patients) were hospitalised with SARS-CoV-2 infection, up from 16 two wees earlier and a fifth of the 2024 print (98 people or 55.4% of all SARI patients).

A total of 84 people in hospital with SARI tested positive for influenza, which corresponds to 38.2% of all SARI patients.

This compares with only 7 influenza patients (4.0% of all SARI patients) in hospital on the 1st week of 2024.

Of the 220 people in hospital with SARI, 86 (39.1%) were aged two or younger, while 69 (31.4%) were 60 and above.

Also, 12 (60%) of the 20 COVID-19 patients were over 60 years of age, up from 10 (62.5%) on the 51st week, but down from 19 (90.5%) on the 50th week.

A year ago, of the 177 people in hospital with SARI, 46 (26%) were aged two or younger, while 106 (60%) were 60 or older. Also, 85 (86.7%) of the 98 COVID-19 patients were over 60 years of age.

The age breakdown of people seeking medical help with ARI and flu-like symptoms are shown below.

The majority of ARI patients belonged in the 0-14 age group throughout the 'flu season' last year, while the share of people going to the doctor with flu-like symptoms was the highest in the 15-34 age group up to the 2nd week of this year when the youngest were in majority until the 40th week bar a couple of weeks towards the end. You fund a heat map in our previous article here.

The number and share of children up to 14 years of age was again higher among people with flu-like symptoms than the number and share of those in the 15-34 age group, after two weeks when they switched places.

Pertussis not gone either

The number of suspected whooping cough cases closed at an absolute record of 1,354 cases in 2024, and we had a w/w doubling of suspected cases to 8 on the 1st week of 2025. Half of those infected were infants.

Cover image (for illustration purposes only): Getty Images