Covid-19: where have the other respiratory diseases gone?

Flu, bronchiolitis, rhinitis … At the beginning of each winter season, respiratory infections multiply. The Covid-19 pandemic could be a game changer.

They are called influenza, bronchiolitis, rhinitis, viral pneumonia, syncytial virus, etc. And fall into the generic family of acute respiratory infections (ARI). However, at this time of year, apart from the Covid-19 pandemic, curfew or re-containment measures, they usually start filling emergencies or even certain hospital services. But since the arrival of the Sars Cov-2, no one is talking about it. As if all these respiratory viral pathologies had disappeared.

“A child under the age of two is exposed to a hundred viruses during his first two years”, recalls Robert Cohen, pediatrician and infectious disease specialist at the intercommunal hospital of Créteil. “But we are not yet sufficiently into the winter season to know whether these pathologies will be more or less severe at the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021.” Regarding the first of these, influenza (2.5 million French people affected on average each year), Santé Publique France has just published its report for the previous year (2019-2020) to congratulate itself on the ” low impact in terms of mortality “, considering that 3,700 deaths were attributable to influenza.