Flu is striking earlier than usual in England, experts have said, insisting that vaccination is the best way to blunt its impact. According to the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), flu is at low levels, but various metrics, such as the proportion of positive tests and GP consultations for influenza-like illness, suggest it is on the rise, with the number of emergency-department attendances for influenza-like illness above seasonally expected levels. Prof Sir Andrew Pollard, the director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, said: “There is one simple action for all those who are at risk because of age or their underlying health conditions, which is to get vaccinated as soon as possible and before we reach the peak of transmission.
A private flu vaccination costs about £20 at most high street pharmacies, and some retailers offer them for under £10 as part of membership schemes. Pollard said an earlier flu season did not necessarily mean a worse flu season. Antonia Ho, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Glasgow’s Centre for Virus Research, said it was important to get vaccinated as soon as possible as it took a few weeks for the vaccine to provide full protection.
While UKHSA has noted that the H1N1 subtype of flu A appears to have changed or “drifted” a little from the strain that was used to make this year’s flu vaccine, Ho said it was too soon to say if that would affect how well the vaccine worked. According to data from UKHSA, the vaccination programme in England last winter is estimated to have prevented about 100,000 hospital admissions and 7,000 deaths, despite the flu season again starting earlier than usual. John Tregoning, a professor of vaccine immunology at Imperial College London and author of the book Infectious: Pathogens and How We Fight Them, said: “Last year is a good example where [we] also had an early start to the flu season, and then because of that, probably people slightly changed their behaviours and went and got vaccinated, and then it comes down again.” Experts have urged those eligible for a Covid jab to get vaccinated, with UKHSA data suggesting levels of Covid are rising.
Tregoning also emphasised the importance of vaccination against respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). Ho said that while vaccination against respiratory diseases was important, there were additional measures people could take if they started to feel unwell.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
