Economy 13 February 2025, 4:19pm

Respiratory season may have peaked in Hungary

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Although the number of influenza-like illnesses per 100,000 inhabitants was higher than on the 6th week of 2025 only once in the past 13 respiratory seasons, the epidemic has abated and we might have seen its peek on the previous week, data released by the National Centre for Public Health and Pharmacy (NNGYK) showed on Thursday.

Key findings:

More than half (52.2%) of the samples tested on the 6th week of 2025 showed infection with some kind of influenza virus;
the influenza positivity rate for all samples tested (22.9%) continues to exceed the cumulated Covid positivity rate (9.4%), while the flu rate never took the lead in the 2023/24 season;
the coronavirus positivity rate was down at 0.8% from 2.3%, while
the RSV positivity rate rose to 4.7% from 2.9%;
the number of human metapneumovirus (HMPV) infections reached 48 or 0.9% of all samples tested, which figures compare with 29 and 0.7% a year earlier;
the number of people hospitalised with severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) dropped from this season's record of 317 on the 5th week to 262, which is below the comparative figures in the 2023/24 (343) and 2022/23 (265) respiratory seasons;
2.3% of those hospitalised tested positive for COVID-19, while there were 101 people with influenza infection in hospital, which corresponds to 38.5% of all SARI patients; and 40 people were treated in hospital with RSV infection (15.3% of all SARI patients); the latter two figures mark a decline w/w;
of the 262 people in hospital with SARI, 90 (34.4%) were aged two years or younger, slightly down from the 5th week, while 67 (25.6%) were aged 60 years and older.

Peak may have been reached

On the 6th week of 2025 (3-9 February), 307,500 people sought medical help with acute respiratory infections (ARI), including 82,100 people with influenza-like illness (ILI), 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, including those with ILI was much higher than at this point in the previous two respiratory seasons.

The share of influenza-like illness in ARI was up at 26.6% from 25.9% on the 5th week, exceeding the comparative readings from the past two seasons (20.2% and 16.8%, respectively), meaning that effectively a quarter of ARI patients showed symptoms of influenza.

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

in terms ari is worse and in terms of people with Influenza-like illness per 100,000 people, the situation is currently way worse than in either of the previous two respiratory seasons.

In the graph below you can compare to the flu situation with the previous 13 respiratory seasons, and find that the situation has been worse than currently (yellow line) only once in 2014/16. Perhaps that's what the NNGYK referred to our inquiry as a "medium-intensity influenza epidemic".

"We also keep a close eye on the rate of serious illness. Currently, 0.09 percent of all patients require hospitalisation. This also shows that the virus currently circulating is not causing more severe illness than we are used to," the NNGYK reassured us in response to our enquiries last week.

Note that the percentage (hospitalisations divided by the number of people seeking medical help with ARI) was actually 0.098% on the 5th week or, let's round it up a bit, 0.1%. It was indeed a smidge lower than in 2023/24 (0.107% and 2022/23 (0.102%). On the 6th week, the ratio dropped further to 0.085%.

Positivity rates

A total of 515 samples were tested on the 5th week (yet another record for the current respiratory season), with 4 coming back COVID-19 positive (down from 12 on the 5th week). The 0.8% positivity rate compares with 3.8% (15 cases) a year ago and 4.1% (6 cases) two years ago.

The share of influenza (52.2%) in the tested samples is well above the previous two years' respective prints (42.6% and 37.2%, respectively), while that of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) remains lower at 4.7% than in 2023/24 (7.8%) and 2022/23 (14.2%).

The following graph may seem a bit fuzzy at first but at least it shows a side-by side comparison of the weekly positivity rates for influenza (green), Covid (orange), and RSV (blue) for the past three respiratory seasons up to the 5th week. It is evident how the flu positivity rate stands out this year, whether we compare it to the corresponding rates in the previous two years or to the Covid and RSV positivity rates.

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 is no longer the main pathogen in samples, with 512 positive tests (9.4% of the 5,426 samples tested), as influenza took over (first on the 4th week) with 1,240 positive samples by week 6 (22.9% of all samples), followed by rhinovirus (50), RSV (84), human metapneumovirus (HMPV, 48), parainfluenza (6), adenovirus (4), and bocavirus (4).

Hospitalisations

262 people with severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) were hospitalised on the 6th week of 2025, of whom 29 (or 11.1%) required intensive care. The highest number of SARI patients in ICU was 36 on the 4th week and their highest ratio was on the 40th week of 2024 (12.8%) and on the 4th week this year (12.3%). In the previous two respiratory seasons 12.5% and 17.7% of SARI patients were treated in ICUs, respectively.

Further breakdown shows that 6 people (2.3% of SARI patients) were hospitalised with SARS-CoV-2 infection, up from 2 a week earlier and way less than either a year ago (26, 7.6%) or two years ago (48, 18.1%).

A total of 101 people in hospital with SARI tested positive for influenza, which corresponds to 38.5% of all SARI patients.

This compares with 105 influenza patients (30.6% of all SARI patients) in hospital on the 6th week of 2024 and 32 (12.1%) on the same week of 2023.

The share of RSV patients edged up to 15.3% (40) from 15.1% (48), which compares with 18.1% (62) a year earlier and 25.3% (67) two years earlier.

Age distribution of hospitalised SARI patients

Of the 262 people in hospital with SARI, 90 (34.4%) were aged two years or younger, which shows a retreat from 114 (36%) a week earlier, while 67 (25.6%) were aged 60 years and older, a sharpish drop from the 5th week (95 or 30%).

Two of the six COVID-19 patients were over 60 years of age. A year ago, of the 343 people in hospital with SARI, 123 (35.9%) were aged two or younger, while 115 (33.5%) were 60 or older. Also, 20 (76.9%) of the 26 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 (and so far this year too), 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 last year when the youngest were in majority for nine weeks and then it was back and forth between the 13th and 20th week. You fund a heat map for the previous season in one of our previous articles here.

The number and share of children up to 14 years of age remains higher among people with influenza-like illness than the number and share of those in the 15-34 age group, for the fourth week in a row, after a brief switch on the first two weeks of 2025.

some 150,000 of people with ARI and 36,000 of people with ILI were in the 0-14 age group on the 6th week of 2025. The former compares with ove 147,000 a year earlier, while the latter compares with almost 24,000 in the base period.

Whooping cough remains with us too

The number of suspected pertussis cases does not seem to be dropping, either. Based on the figures for the first three weeks of the year, it looks likely that 2025 will bring another record, unless a dramatic improvement occurs along the way.

The number of suspected whooping cough cases closed at an absolute record of 1,354 cases in 2024. After a w/w doubling of suspected cases to 17 from 8 on the 2nd week of 2025, authorities reported 17 suspected cases for the 3rd week, 12 cases for the 4th week, and 15 cases for the 5th week, by which time over 36% of the 69 cases were infants this year. Also, about 48% of the infections were detected in the 0-14 age group and 55% in the 0-19 age group.