Covid-19 slows flu season
Sweeping measures brought in to prevent the spread of coronavirus have helped flu levels plummet to historical lows.
The nationwide lockdown and strict controls over social distancing and personal hygiene have put a handbrake on the traditional winter flu season, which typically gets into swing around this time of year.
Data from the Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR) shows just a third of the usual number of people visited their doctor with flu-like symptoms in the first week of June.
Calls to Healthline about respiratory illnesses are also down.
Experts have welcomed the findings but warned the flu season will still come, and urged the public to keep up good hygiene, particularly when out in public.
‘‘We can’t be complacent with the flu virus,’’ said virologist Dr Sue Huang, director of the World Health Organisation National Influenza Centre at ESR.
‘‘Flu is just like Covid-19 – it is a respiratory virus that needs person-to-person transmission.
‘‘Level 1 means we have more chances of person-to-person interactions, so there is more chance for the virus to pass around.’’
Around 200,000 Kiwis catch flu each year, the virus causing about 400 to 500 deaths.
But 80 per cent of flu is asymptomatic, meaning people do not know they have it.
Seven outbreaks of influenzalike illness were reported across the country in April, according to the Ministry of Health, all in longterm care facilities; 10 people died, but no influenza viruses were identified in any of the outbreaks.
A record 1.75 million doses of flu vaccine have already been distributed this year, more than
900,000 Kiwis receiving shots by the end of May.
In Canterbury, more than
144,7000 flu vaccines were recorded on the National Immunisation Record as of June 4, with almost three quarters of people aged 65 and over being vaccinated.
The ESR data shows that flu rates remain well below historical averages for this time of year.
The rate of consultations for flu-like illnesses – coughs or fever – for the week ending June 5 was five per 100,000, compared with a historical rate of 16.5 per 100,000.
Rates peaked at 25 per 100,000 at the end of March as concerns about coronavirus swept the country but fell to 4.3 per 100,000 the following month during lockdown.
With winter tightening its grip, this time of year also tends to see more calls to Healthline from those with flu-like symptoms, but that has dropped from a historical rate of almost 22 per 100,000 to 15.7, down from a high at the end of March of almost 84 per 100,000.
Reports of fever and cough among people reporting symptoms to the FluTracking website are also markedly down on recent years, at around 0.1 per cent of people last week compared with three to four per cent in the last two years.
Associate professor Nikki Turner, director of the Immunisation Advisory Centre, said fewer people going to work because of the lockdown and a greater takeup of vaccination had delayed the start of the flu season.
‘‘It is not just flu – all our respiratory numbers are way down,’’ she told The Press.
‘‘This week we are just starting to see respiratory conditions again, which is exactly what you would expect with people out and about and moving more.
‘‘We can’t predict the flu season, but it will come. We are all hoping it will be a mild season but we can’t guarantee that.’’
Turner urged people to continue taking hygiene and health precautions similar to those under coronavirus to help stave off the spread of flu.
‘‘New Zealand showed it can do it for coronavirus, and we are hoping we can reduce the burden of flu. We can’t get rid of it completely but we can reduce it.’’
‘‘Flu is just like Covid19 – it is a respiratory virus that needs person-to-person transmission.’’
Dr Sue Huang virologist