Seasonal flu running at very low levels in Europe
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Levels of normal seasonal influenza are extremely low across Europe, despite growing worries about bird flu following three deaths in Turkey, experts said on Tuesday.
The incidence of clinical influenza was around or below baseline levels—the level generally seen in the summer—at the start of the year, according to the Dutch-based European Influenza Surveillance Scheme (EISS).
In the week to January 1, sporadic cases of seasonal flu were reported in just 6 of the 28 European countries participating in the scheme—Britain, France, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden.
One reason for the low incidence may be widespread immunity against circulating B strains of the flu virus, which experts believe have changed very little compared to the corresponding viruses found last winter.
A major outbreak of seasonal flu at this stage in the season would be unusual but not unprecedented, according to EISS epidemiologist Liesbeth Meuwissen.
“Influenza activity can vary a lot between seasons, so we will have to see what happens in the coming weeks,” she said by telephone from Utrecht.
In five of the past nine seasons, flu activity started after the turn of the year in more than half of European countries, according to the EISS.
Levels of seasonal flu have no direct bearing on the risk a flu pandemic, which experts fear may be triggered by bird flu.
The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu remains hard for people to catch but there are worries it could mutate into a form easily transmitted among humans, possibly by swapping genes with seasonal flu viruses, leading to a pandemic that could kill millions.
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