The number of influenza-relevant admissions to Queen Mary Hospital and the number of serious cases began to decrease, but there are more patients with COVID-19 admitted to the hospital, and the number of serious cases has also increased, said Ivan Hung, head of the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Department of Medicine at the University of Hong Kong.
He predicted that the peak of the COVID-19 outbreak will be from the middle to the end of next month, and it will go down in December, and then there will be a peak of influenza in February next year (during the Chinese New Year), describing that influenza and COVID-19 will be peaked at intervals with each other.
According to Kung, the number of hospital admissions and deaths during the summer influenza peak is also higher than that before the COVID epidemic.
"Hong Kong has been in a state of alert for the past three years, and most of the people were wearing masks at that time, so basically there has been no outbreak of influenza in those years," said Kung, "after removing the masks, however, some of the elderly people have not taken influenza vaccination, and young children have not yet been exposed to influenza since birth, so the overall community's antibodies level are on the low side."
He believes that it is most important for children, elderly and chronically ill people to be vaccinated against influenza.
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