Flu-stricken patients flocking to the city’s emergency rooms

Calgary has seen a massive spike in patients with influenza flocking to hospitals compared to the same period last year, says Alberta Health Services.

Numbers provided to Postmedia News by the health authority show 41 people have been hospitalized in the just over two months since flu season began, compared to just three over the same period in 2015.

Across Alberta, 70 have gone to emergency rooms so far, about six times the number recorded last year.

In the South Zone, covering jurisdictions south of Calgary, there have been 10 hospitalizations owing to the infectious disease while a year ago there had been none by the beginning of November.

Dr. Judy MacDonald, medical officer of health for the Calgary Zone, said while the numbers seem high compared to a year ago, it’s most likely due to the fact that flu season started a bit early in the southern part of the province.

“Influenza is definitely here, especially in the Calgary Zone,” she said.

“The numbers we’re seeing are reflective of the fact that influenza is hitting much earlier than we saw last year.”

While the southern part of the province is seeing the brunt of the cases, other regions are also up, with Edmonton seeing 10 hospitalizations compared to six last year, and with increases recorded in the North and Central zones as well.

At the end of last year’s flu season, AHS reported 62 people had died from the disease. Comparatively, 90 people succumbed to influenza in 2014, three times the number that died in 2013.

No deaths linked to influenza have been reported this year.

Even as the number of hospital visits are rising, so too are the numbers of people getting flu shots compared to the same period last year.

As of Nov. 17, nearly 50,000 more Albertans have received flu shots compared to last year’s pace, with 736,813 rolling up their sleeves already. Last year, nearly 1.15 million were inoculated.

MacDonald said while that’s encouraging, far too many Albertans remain seemingly indifferent to the potentially deadly disease.

“That’s still well below what we’d like to see and we still have lots of vaccine,” said MacDonald, who noted only about 30 per cent of Albertans were vaccinated last flu season.

“I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s something about being human that we dismiss things that are common.”

Most at risk from influenza are the youngest and most elderly populations, who can see symptoms become fatal in some circumstances, MacDonald said.

In all, just under 1,700 people were hospitalized last year, the majority of those in the Edmonton Zone.

And it’s because of that risk that AHS continues to push the message that vaccinations can save lives.

“All the messaging we put out, trying to make the vaccine more accessible, and the numbers are still pretty low,” she said.

“It’s a really hard message to get across.”