Flu epidemic accelerates, bronchiolitis persists


The Covid-19 pandemic in Francecase

As the omicron variant continues to gain ground, the other cold season ailments are present in full force. Health actors fear a relaxation of barrier gestures as well as reduced immunity since the start of the pandemic.

It’s not just Covid-19 in life. The flu epidemic continues to accelerate in France, where it has won this week in the Paris region. Christmas week was marked by a “Continued increase in influenza indicators, particularly in children”, summarizes the health agency Public Health France in its weekly report.

Île-de-France is now considered to be in the epidemic phase. The region thus joins Occitania, the first metropolitan region to have crossed this threshold the previous week. In overseas territories, this is the case for Mayotte and Reunion. A large number of regions are also at the preliminary stage, that of the pre-epidemic phase. This concerns, among others, Brittany and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. Normandy and Burgundy-Franche-Comté are still spared.

Last winter, successive confinements and curfews as well as anti-Covid barrier gestures had helped block a large majority of viruses, including influenza. But this year it is making a comeback and strikes a population that has been less infected than usual. The French are therefore logically less immunized collectively. A set of factors that raise fears according to health professionals of a stronger epidemic this year, as well as for other seasonal diseases such as gastroenteritis.

3,824 children under the age of two who went through the emergency room

The surge in cases is not just about the flu. This has already been the case for several weeks with regard to bronchiolitis, a disease that mainly affects babies. Common and highly contagious, it causes coughing and difficult, rapid, wheezing and wheezing. Most of the time benign, it may however require a visit to the emergency room, or even hospitalization. . Last week, all metropolitan areas were affected by this epidemic. The situation has been going on since early November

However, there was “A decrease in emergency room visits (and) hospitalizations”, observes Public Health France. A total of 3,824 children under the age of two went to the emergency room for bronchiolitis last week. A large third were hospitalized.



Source link -83