2023-11-02 18:10:18
The annual bronchiolitis epidemic, which mainly affects babies, has spread to new French regions in recent days, even if its level remains lower for the time being than the historic outbreak of last year, the agency announced on Thursday. public health.
Last week, “activity linked to bronchiolitis was still increasing in community medicine and in hospitals among children under two years old“, summarizes a weekly report from Public Health France.
Centre-Val de Loire and the Grand-Est have now entered the epidemic phase, joining Brittany, Île-de-France, Normandy and Pays de la Loire in mainland France. Overseas, three regions (Guadeloupe, Martinique, Guyana) remain in the epidemic phase.
Bronchiolitis, caused primarily by respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), causes babies to have difficulty breathing. Generally not serious, it can sometimes lead to visits to the emergency room and hospitalizations.
Last year, it was the cause of an unprecedented epidemic in more than ten years, sending tens of thousands of infants to hospital.
The current level of hospitalizations, however, remains lower than it was last year, even if it is still far too early to draw conclusions about the face of the epidemic this season.
One of the big questions is the effect that a new preventive treatment, Sanofi’s Beyfortus, will have. Initially offered to all babies born since February, it is currently reserved for maternity wards, pending new stocks.
Public Health France has also given an assessment of two other diseases: Covid, in a declining phase, and seasonal flu, still limited to a few sporadic cases in mainland France while awaiting the inevitable annual epidemic. Only Reunion, in a special situation because it is subject to a reverse climate in the Southern hemisphere, is already in the epidemic phase.
The flu vaccination campaign, targeting the most vulnerable such as those over 65, “starts well“, declared Tuesday on RTL the Minister of Health, Aurélien Rousseau.
“We are going faster than last year, we are at 1.6 million vaccinated as we speak“, he said, calling for people to be vaccinated simultaneously against the flu and Covid, for which the threshold of two million injections has just been crossed as part of the current campaign.
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