Influenza, experts warn: vaccines essential for the elderly and for keeping hospitals running

This monitoring describes the most serious cases and related deaths associated with influenza, in particular those intercepted by hospitals, and is one of the sources on which estimates of the impact of the influenza season on the population are based, through which an average of 8,000 deaths from influenza and its complications are attributed each year in Italy.

"These data, when we are approaching autumn and the beginning of the season in which respiratory infections increase," says Anna Teresa Palamara, who heads the department of Infectious Diseases at the Iss, "confirm that influenza, especially in people who are fragile due to various concomitant conditions, can lead to serious consequences. We therefore recommend vaccination, according to the Ministry of Health's indications, to reduce the risks especially in these people'.

The region with the highest incidence of Sari last year was Val D'Aosta (40.7 per million inhabitants), followed by the province of Bolzano (26.3), Tuscany and the province of Trento. The lowest in Campania (0.7), Sicily (1.5) and Sardinia (1.9). The identikit of the most affected: between 60 and 79 years old; mostly men and most of the serious cases had one or more concomitant diseases, with a prevalence of cardiovascular diseases.

Beyond the trend of serious cases from season to season, influenza can hit the elderly and frail population very hard. And it can bring the care system to its knees, starting with family doctors' offices and emergency rooms, the first gateway to the hospital. To remind us of this, with Australian data in hand, according to which influenza in the other hemisphere has already led to a 50% increase in hospitalisations, are the leaders of the Italian Society of Emergency-Urgency Medicine. According to president Alessandro Riccardi, 'the combination of the two data - the characteristics of the next flu and the vaccination status of the population - suggests that the upcoming "winter emergency" could be the worst in the last twenty years and will occur in a condition of general difficulty of the National Health Service that does not need new descriptions. I would like to specify, however,' he added, 'that the term 'emergency' for this type of event has always been contested by our scientific society as they are entirely predictable'. For past president Fabio De Iaco, a 'film we have already seen' is on the horizon, but this time the plot could be more dramatic: 'We already know that in a few months we will be telling of ambulances queuing up in front of increasingly overcrowded emergency rooms, of professionals in distress, of hospitals that are inadequate with respect to needs. It happens every year, but the coming flu season risks setting hitherto unheard of records. Faced with this risk, the only way forward is vaccination'.

The emergency room doctors are therefore also sounding the alarm about the serious risk to public health in the coming months, on which they are calling for preventive action to be taken as a matter of urgency.

According to the representatives of the Scientific Society, it is vital to pursue by all means the objective of widespread vaccination, not only on the population most exposed to the greatest risks but also, as supported by the ministry itself, on the general population.
Citizens - the experts stress - must understand two fundamental concepts: the first is that vaccination for influenza and for Covid-19 gives each individual patient, especially if frail or elderly, a capacity for 'personal defence' that cannot be obtained in any other way. The second, that widespread vaccination is the only solution capable of averting those situations of overcrowding in hospitals and emergency rooms that are the cause, not only of discomfort, but of real and dangerous delays in treatment for anyone who needs it, even for reasons unrelated to influenza or virosis.