Last winter, New Zealand experienced a decrease in common cold cases of 99.9 percent as a result of infection control measures – and a reduction in cases of the so-called RS virus of 98 percent.
Over the past five weeks, the country has registered nearly 1,000 cases of the RS virus, according to Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR). By comparison, New Zealand registers an average of 1,743 cases during the 29-week winter season, according to The Guardian.
RS virus, or respiratory syncytial virus, is a common cause of pneumonia in infants and young children. On Friday, Dagbladet wrote that a number of cases of the virus make American doctors stunned – as the RS virus season usually runs from November to May.
Also in Norway, the RS virus is on the agenda as a result of the increased incidence in several countries.
– We are working on a risk assessment of, among other things, RS virus, said FHI chief physician Margrethe Greve-Isdahl to Dagbladet later the same day.
Doctors sound alarm about mysterious children’s trend
«Immunitetsgjeld»
The reason for the boom is believed to be that the RS virus has not circulated as usual this winter due to strong infection control during the corona pandemic.
Because of this, infants and young children may be “at greater risk of developing serious illness now, if they become infected,” writes the US National Institutes of Health. CDC.
The phenomenon got a name already in May, when a group of French researchers published an article in the journal Infectious Diseases Now.
They call it “immunity debt.” Infection control measures, they argue, have slowed the spread of coronavirus – but also other viral and bacterial infections. This in turn may have prevented children from developing immunity to diseases they would otherwise have been protected from.
“The longer these periods of low exposure to viruses and bacteria last, the greater the probability of future epidemics,” the researchers write.
New Zealand is now registering a startling number of respiratory infections, several of them caused by the RS virus. In the capital Wellington, 46 children were hospitalized with respiratory disease on Thursday – several of them due to the RS virus, and two in the intensive care unit.
Striking figures – the Danes warn
– Vulnerable children
The “immunity debt” is now taking effect in New Zealand. Epidemiologist and professor at the University of Otago, Michael Baker, explains that most people will be exposed to the virus during their first year of life.
“If you remove this exposure, you end up with a larger accumulation of vulnerable children, and thus – as we now see – a much larger outbreak can take place when they are finally exposed to the virus,” he told The Guardian.
Baker emphasizes, however, that the peak of RS virus infection the country is experiencing will not necessarily lead to more cases of infection than usual, overall. He does not rule out that there may simply be an accumulation of cases of infection that would otherwise have been spread over a longer period of time.
The accumulation can still present problems:
– A peak of infection can overload the health service, or put it under significant pressure. We now see that with the RS virus, he says.
The strain on the health service is felt, among other things, at Middlemore Hospital in Auckland, where a playroom has had to be converted into a temporary hospital room with eleven beds for infants.
Cases began to skyrocket in June, according to The New Zealand Herald. ESR virologist Sue Huang informs the newspaper that more than 500 cases were registered by 27 June.
At the end of May, a total of only 20 cases had been reported.
“The exponential increase is very sharp,” Huang told the newspaper.
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These are the symptoms
Symptoms of RS infection include the following, according to National Institute of Public Health: cough, fever, later rapid respiration, prolonged wheezing expiration (exhalation, journ.anm.), lethargy, fatigue and difficulty coughing up mucus. About 20 percent get ear infections.
In Norway, only a few develop serious symptoms and must be hospitalized. The virus nevertheless constitutes an important reason for hospitalization among young children, the institute writes.
Figures from the USA show that 1.7 percent of children under 6 months are hospitalized due to RS virus, and 60 to 70 percent of all children have during the first year of life undergone RS virus infection with a peak between two to five months of age. The disease is a major cause of infant mortality in developing countries.
Ravages several countries
Lures with millions
New Zealand is not alone in experiencing a boom in the virus.
In the United States, the state infection control agency has the CDC notified of increased incidence of the RS virus in the south of the country, and recommended extended testing of patients with acute respiratory problems who have not been diagnosed with corona.
“I have never seen anything like it,” Medical Director Kate Dutkiewicz at Beacon Children’s Hospital in South Bend, Indiana, told the news agency AP Thursday – shortly after she had treated two RS-infected children who needed oxygen.
Friday also reported the Danish newspaper BT about increasing incidence of the virus in Denmark.
«In week 26, 49 cases of RS virus were registered in Denmark. The number has been rising since week 20, and a total of 112 Danes have been affected by the disease during that period “, the newspaper writes, referring to figures from the Statens Serum Institut (SSI).
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