FEATURE STORY
Don’t skip the flu jab Flu cases may be virtually non-existent thanks to COVID-19, but health experts warn against complacency and say an influenza pandemic is always a future possibility. WORDS: Leigh Robshaw.
W
ith COVID in the spotlight over the past 18 months, it seems the usual public health baddie at this time of year – the flu – has gone MIA. Flu rates are at an historic low, and while many of us are keen to get the COVID jab, the prevailing attitude towards the flu vaccine is a bit ‘meh’. But while flu numbers are down, now is not the time to forget about the flu vaccine, public health experts say. Professor John Lowe, from the University of the Sunshine Coast, says that kind of complacency “is just what will start the brushfire”. Prof Lowe says we’re going to have to get used to a new way of life – handwashing, social distancing, a yearly flu jab and possibly an annual COVID vaccination – for the foreseeable future. “Skipping the flu vaccine this year is not recommended because, as we’ve seen with COVID, outbreaks can occur immediately and what you’re doing is taking a chance that you’re going to be in a flu-free or COVID-free environment,” he says. “As we’ve seen so many times, all it takes is one person to come into that environment and everything can change. “From a public health perspective, it wouldn’t be recommended that you not get the flu vaccine or COVID vaccine, or quit washing your hands and social distancing.” Still, the reduced flu rates are good news. The Australian Influenza Surveillance
10 My Weekly Preview | July 1, 2021
10.indd 1
Report is published fortnightly during the influenza season, typically between May and October. Up to the week ending June 6 this year, only 326 flu notifications had been reported to the National Notifiable Disease Surveillance System (NNDSS) across Australia, with no associated deaths. No hospital admissions due to influenza have been reported across the major reporting hospitals since surveillance started in April this year. Contrast that with the corresponding period two years ago. In the fortnight between June 17 and June 30, 2019, a total of 22,047 notifications of influenza were reported to the NNDSS. Of those, 3528 were in Queensland alone. The Australian Department of Health’s 2019 Influenza Season summary showed a total of 310,011 laboratory-confirmed flu notifications to the beginning of December. On a more serious note, by October 6 that year, more than 800 influenzaassociated deaths had been officially recorded for 2019, with 782 of those deaths due to influenza A. Those victims ranged in age from under 12 months to 102 years. Dr Penny Hutchinson, a Sunshine Coast Hospital and Health Service public health physician, says Australia continues to have significantly lower numbers of confirmed influenza cases locally, statewide and nationally compared with the same time in previous years. “Actions to prevent COVID – such as social distancing, increase in hand and
“I think we can expect that neither the flu or COVID are going to go away” Professor John Lowe, USC
respiratory hygiene, isolating when unwell and … the closure of borders to international travel and quarantining of international travellers – [have been] effective in preventing influenza,” she says. While Dr Hutchinson says it’s difficult to determine how many people have had the flu jab this year. But from information available, flu vaccination rates for 2021 to date are lower than previous years. FluTracking shows only 45 per cent of Australians aged between 18 and 64 had
received the flu vaccine by May 20, while at the same point last year, 71.8 per cent of people in that age bracket had been vaccinated. Experts believe possible reasons for this are complacency due to the lower flu rates and a greater sense of urgency to have the COVID vaccine. “Given there is a time interval between the administration of COVID-19 and the influenza vaccine, this may impact on when people have their influenza vaccine,” Dr Hutchinson says. She tells My Weekly Preview that the low take-up of the flu vaccine “could be due to the lower rates of influenza or a delay in people having their influenza vaccine due to the need to have the COVID-19 vaccine as soon as possible”. With most people now habitually handwashing, socially distancing and staying home when sick, could this change the face of the flu as we know it? “Globally, influenza numbers are low and this reflects the reduction in international travel and the quarantining of international travellers,” Dr Hutchinson says. “But once international borders re-open, it is likely influenza cases will increase. Given this may not be for another 12 months, influenza numbers may remain low for the foreseeable future. “Influenza is a zoonotic disease [derived from animals] and will eventually return. There is also the possibility that we will have another influenza pandemic.” myweeklypreview.com.au
28/06/2021 3:58:43 PM