Dozens visit hospital as nasty flu hits
Immunization clinics remain open in city
A particularly nasty kind of influenza circulating in the city this year has sent dozens of people to hospital, with thousands of Calgarians lining up to get their flu shots in the last few days to ward off the illness.
By midday Saturday, the Calgary zone had 274 lab-confirmed cases of influenza since the start of the season, with most of the cases being the H1N1 pandemic strain from four years ago.
In a 24-hour period between Friday and Saturday, 33 new positive lab reports were recorded, including 13 cases that required hospitalization, said Dr. Judy MacDonald, medical officer of health for Alberta Health Services in Calgary.
While the number of cases isn’t unusual as the season picks up steam, the number of severe influenza illnesses sending people to the hospital is high, with 122 cases reported, she said.
The number of H1N1 cases is also higher than it’s been since the influenza pandemic went around the world in 2009, MacDonald noted.
“In the intervening years between then, we haven’t seen as much H1N1 circulating, haven’t seen as many people in the intensive care unit,” she said.
Since the official flu season began at the end of August, three people in the Calgary area have died of influenza-related causes, including one person who contracted H1N1 in December, according to MacDonald.
The person’s age and gender haven’t been released publicly.
It’s not clear why this year’s influenza season has made so many people seriously ill enough to need a hospital bed.
The H1N1 strain typically affects younger and middle-aged people, rather than seniors, MacDonald said.
“It’s still a fairly new kid on the block. Even though every vaccine has included protection since then (2009), we still as a whole population may not have as much immunity to it, and are therefore seeing more people getting ill with it and getting more severely ill with it,” she said.
Since H1N1 emerged in 2009, the vaccine against it has been effective, said Dr. Jim Dickinson, a professor of family medicine and community health sciences at the University of Calgary.
“It was a new combination at the time and now it’s stayed fairly stable since then. The good thing about it is because it’s fairly stable, the vaccine against it is reasonably effective,” said Dickinson, who also runs an Alberta influenza surveillance program that collects and analyzes data from a network of family physicians.
“If you actually had that particular strain in any year, 2009 onward, then you’re probably immune for life to that particular strain, and the small variations of it,” he added.
Calgary’s mass immunization clinics remain open at Brentwood Village Mall and South Calgary Health Centre, with regular hours in January, and reduced hours in February and March.
About 2,500 people lined up for their influenza shot on Friday and Saturday, MacDonald said. “We have seen more people coming in to get vaccine, which is a great thing.”