Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On behalf of the Minister for Health, Deputy Simon Harris, I thank Deputies Burton and Kelleher for giving me the opportunity to update the House on this issue. The Minister sends his apologies for not being able to be here.

As Deputies are aware influenza can be a serious illness for people in at-risk groups and can lead to hospitalisation and death. At-risk people include those aged 65 years and older, those with chronic illness requiring regular medical follow-up, those with lower immunity due to disease or treatment, pregnant women and residents of nursing homes and other long-stay facilities.

The priority for this winter is to increase take-up of the influenza vaccine in at-risk groups and in health care workers to reduce and control the incidence of flu and outbreaks in the community and health care settings. As Deputies will recall, the HSE launched its immunisation and Under the Weather campaigns for the 2017-2018 season earlier this month. By reducing the incidence of influenza, we reduce the need for people to seek treatments and, consequently, reduce the demands on health services. The HSE has put in place significant measures to ensure it is prepared for influenza this winter. A national steering group is in place to co-ordinate the response. Each hospital group and community health organisation has submitted a flu plan based on the evidence of last year’s successes and areas for action over the oncoming season. Each long-term care facility and private nursing home has received a detailed communication on how to prepare for and deal with flu. Additionally, each hospital group and associated community health organisation were requested to produce a winter plan which includes a specific section on flu. These plans were reviewed at a national meeting earlier this week. The HSE must be commended on the preparations it has made for this winter. Those preparations will significantly reduce the impact of influenza on the health services.

I take this opportunity to address concerns relating to the effectiveness of the vaccine and the impact of influenza in other parts of the world. The strain currently circulating in Australia is similar to the one which dominated in Ireland last winter and the vaccine for use in Ireland contains this strain of the virus and should afford protection. The latest surveillance reports relating to Australia indicate that the peak week of national influenza activity was comparable or higher than in recent years. However, clinical severity was low to moderate and the proportion of hospitalised patients admitted directly to intensive care units has been on the lower range reported in recent years. These latest reports also indicated that the vaccine was a good match for the circulating flu strains.

In Ireland, flu activity, as measured by influenza-like illness rates, is currently low, similar to other European countries. While it is too early to comment definitively on the efficacy of the seasonal flu vaccine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States have indicated that it is 50% to 60% effective in preventing hospitalisation in older people and 80% effective in preventing death in the elderly. Also of note is that no particular concerns were expressed in relation to either the current flu season or vaccine effectiveness at the EU joint meeting of chief medical officers and chief veterinary officers on influenza preparedness earlier this week.

Finally, I remind Deputies that vaccination remains, as Deputy Burton said, the most effective means of preventing infection by seasonal influenza viruses. We ask people to engage with the HSE's campaign of recent weeks.

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