The province of Buenos Aires has just released the latest data on flu vaccination of this campaign and some figures are alarming. Perhaps the most striking of all is the number of doctors and health assistants who at this time of the year still they have not been vaccinated against the flu.
The campaign against the influenza virus began last march and the response of the population has been timid. This was alerted both by the Ministry of Health and by the Argentine Society of Vaccinology and Epidemiology (SAVE), which for this reason decided to go out to vaccinate people in neighborhoods of the City and the Province.
The data from the Buenos Aires Epidemiological Bulletin published in the last few hours indicate that within health personnel, three out of ten Have not yet received the flu vaccine. The situation is even worse in the group labeled as “essential personnel”, in which seven out of ten they have not received it.
In the first case, they are doctors and workers from other health specialties who are usually in the first line of care, obviously in contact with patients. In the second case, it is State personnel exposed to daily work situations that require a superior immune coverage to that of the rest of the population.
That immune coverage is relevant not only personallyto prevent serious infection in people highly exposed to contagious situations, but also to community level. In other words, for doctors to become eventual links in the chain of contagion for not having given the flu vaccine would be a kind of “height of health.”
During the Covid pandemic, doctors and nurses were the first to receive the vaccine. Photo: Guillermo Rodríguez Adami
The question that remains, in addition, is whether doctors who do not get vaccinated recommend their patients to get vaccinated. This obviously has not been measured. But it has become clear that after the vaccination against Covid, the healthy habit of receiving the planned doses per calendarwhich in Argentina was practically naturalized, has begun to suffer.
What the experts say
Pablo Moreno, president of the Argentine Society of Pediatrics (SAP), analyzed the health scenario: “Pediatricians in general are pro-vaccines, but they still we did not manage to recover pre-pandemic coverage levels. It happens with all vaccines. We must continue working to improve that coverage more and more”.
Although he said that the greatest concern at this time for the age group under two years of age is the respiratory syncytial virus, he assured that the SAP constantly emphasizes the importance of receiving the flu vaccine, which for risk groups is free.
Infectious disease specialist Eduardo López, head of the Department of Medicine at the Ricardo Gutiérrez Children’s Hospital, said that “health professionals should receive flu vaccine every year. Normally, in previous years, it was the group that was vaccinated the most, with percentages above the 90 percent”.
López added that “this figure (70 percent coverage) is worrying and surprising”. And he highlighted two problems that cause health professionals not to get vaccinated: “The first is that we are much more exposed to the flu virus because we work with patients with respiratory and you run the risk to have more severe disease.
López defined the deficient vaccination coverage in health personnel as “worrying and surprising.” Photo: Luciano Thieberger
“On the other hand, by not getting vaccinated, the health professional can infect those around you: other co-workers or eventually, even, to patients. Let’s not forget that in adults the flu virus begins to be eliminated 48 hours before before the symptoms start.
poor coverage
Observing the rest of the risk groups and what vaccination coverage against the influenza virus they have -until June 20- gives that within the group of older than 65 years a third of the total number of people of that age in the province of Buenos Aires have received the corresponding dose.
in the group of 6 to 24 months old, 6 out of 10 has not received the vaccine. In this case there are two doses and 58.7 percent did not receive any. Only 25.3 percent received the first. And in the group of 25 months to 8 years with risk factors, 47 percent did not receive any dose. Between the pregnant and postpartum the statistics are even worse, with 75.9 percent not receiving the vaccine.
The Buenos Aires goals for this point in the vaccination campaign were much more ambitious than those achieved. The goal was to reach the 82.7 percent for health personnel81.3 percent of the group of boys from 6 to 24 months, pregnant women, postpartum women and people with risk factors and the 80 percent those over 65 and essential personnel.
Those over 65 years of age have an indication to get vaccinated against influenza and pneumonia. Photo: Shutterstock.
Although this year the flu is not hitting as much as in 2022 (a year that marked a historical record) the figures they are not underestimated. The latest record released indicates that up to now there were more than 371 thousand infectionsa higher figure for this same time of the year than in 2018 and 2019, years prior to the pandemic.
In recent weeks, a growing circulation of influenza A (H1N1)which caused the 2009 pandemic. Given the eloquent growing detachment of the population for active immunization, in the Province they indicated that as a complement to the national campaign they are going to vaccinate House for house and in nursery schools, as well as in waiting rooms for pediatric and obstetric services.
According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), during the 2019-2020 biennium (the last influenza season before the pandemic) flu vaccination reduced the risk of getting sick between 40 and 60 percent.
In addition, among adults hospitalized with influenza, vaccinated patients had a 59 percent less risk of admission to intensive care units than those who had not been vaccinated. And those vaccinated passed on average four days less at the hospital.
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2023-07-01 09:01:36
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