Expert warns flu seasons may overlap and stresses need for children to get jabs

Influenza infections are surging and the current season may overlap with an approaching summer spike, an expert has warned, adding the city should discuss including the vaccination on the list of recommended jabs for children.

With flu already claiming the lives of four children this year, Dr Mike Kwan Yat-wah, an honorary associate professor at the University of Hong Kong’s department of paediatrics and adolescent medicine, urged parents to take their children to be vaccinated for better protection.

He said statistics from health authorities showed the number of consultations on flu infections in both general outpatient and private clinics had soared while public hospitals had recently recorded daily full occupancy rates.

“We expect the summer flu season to come next, so it’s possible there will be an overlap between winter and summer flu seasons,” Kwan told a radio programme yesterday.

Since flu infections could persist from the first to second half of the year, there might even be “a series of flu seasons”, he added.

Health authorities urged the public to get flu shots following the death of a third child, warning that more severe cases of respiratory diseases were to be expected.

The fourth case was a six-yearold boy who had no history of poor health and had not received a flu jab. He died on Wednesday. Tests came back positive for influenza A subtype H1. A clinical diagnosis indicated his infection was complicated by encephalopathy, a group of conditions causing brain dysfunction.

The case underscored Kwan’s point that flu infection in children could lead to acute necrotising encephalopathy, which had a mortality rate of 70 per cent or had a chance of causing permanent disability after recovery.

Kwan said the most effective means of protection against flu was vaccination, yet many parents had misconceptions about the vaccines and held back from getting their children inoculated.

Given the severe situation, he said discussion was needed on whether flu shots should be added to the list of recommended jabs for children under the Hong Kong Childhood Immunisation Programme, which he said could help prompt hesitant parents to get their children vaccinated.

The Centre for Health Protection recently warned the flu season would last longer this year because of the low vaccination rate, adding the dominant virus strain had shifted from influenza A subtype H3, found in infections from January to March, to subtype H1 recorded in the most recent cases.