RSV hospitalization rate for seniors is 10 times higher than usual for this point in the season

Cnn
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The respiratory virus season started at the start of children this year and flooded children’s hospitals in many regions of the country – in particular with the syncytial respiratory virus, known as Vrs.

But adults can also get the RSV. Although RSV generally does not send as many adults to the hospital, it can be a serious and even fatal disease for the elderly and people with underlying health problems.

And with more children obtaining RSV, the chances that adults are exposed also increases. Some doctors say they are starting to see an increase in adult patients.

This season, around 6 seniors out of 100,000 have been hospitalized with RSV, according to data from US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is significantly lower than the rate for children but still unusually high. In the years preceding the COVVI-19 pandemic, hospitalization rates for the elderly were approximately 10 times lower than this stage of the season.

Dr. Ann Falsey, professor of infectious diseases at the University of Rochester Medical Center who published research on the RSV in adults, said that the VRS increased somewhat in children in summer and at the start of last year, but the United States did not see the usual proportional increase in the RSV in the elderly at the time.

“I think the elderly were more careful to continue public health measures such as masks and social distance last year, because they still worried about Covid,” said Falsey. “But this year, we are starting to see elderly people meet in the hospital with RSV, because everyone throws caution in the wind.”

Too often, RSV flies under the radar in adults, she said. Many people, even doctors, neglect its impact on adults.

“They consider it strictly a pediatric disease, but you know, if you do not test it, you will never know what someone is really sick,” said Falsey.

In the United States, monitoring of viruses as RSV is not as deepened as for COVID-19, it is therefore difficult to know exactly how many adults fall sick with the RSV. The number of cases of RSV comes from self-reports which go to a few dozen laboratories which represent only about one tenth of the population, and the reports are then shared with the CDC.

Based on the best estimates, there are between 10,000 and 15,000 adult deaths in the United States of RSV each year and around 150,000 RSV hospitalizations, Falsey said.

A 2015 study of the elderly in industrialized countries said that the RSV disease is “substantial” and calculated that around 14.5% of the 1.5 million adults who captured the RSV were admitted to hospitals. People who were 65 years old and over were more likely to be hospitalized than 50 to 64 years.

“When we compare it with flu A, it is not too far behind it,” said Falsey, referring to one of the strains of seasonal flu which is often linked to a more serious illness.

RSV appears in adults in the same way as in children. It can look like a cold and include the flowing nose, a decrease in appetite, a cough, sneezing, fever and whistling breathing. Symptoms usually last a week or two, and they cleare themselves with rest and fluids.

But in some adults, RSV can become dangerous because it can cause dehydration, respiratory problems and more serious illnesses such as pneumonia and bronchiolitis, inflammation of tiny respiratory tract in the lungs.

Adults who are most seriously at risk of serious results with RSV are those aged 65 and over. The virus can spread quickly in a nursing home or a long-term care establishment, just like COVID-19 and the flu.

Adults with weakened immune systems should be careful during the RSV season. This may include people with cancer treatment, transplanted patients, living people and those who take certain drugs that remove the immune system for diseases such as Crohn arthritis, lupus or rheumatoid arthritis.

Adults with heart disease or chronic illness such as asthma, MPOC or heart failure are also more likely to have to go to the hospital if they catch the RSV.

An infected person can transmit the RSV by a cough or sneeze. If the respiratory droplets land on a surface like a door handle or an office and someone else touches it and then touches their face, they can fall sick.

This is also spreading because healthy adults will often not know that they have it. This generally does not cause fatigue like the flu or the fact of the cocvid, so many adults will work or jump on a plane or a bus, going up their symptoms to allergies. As they interact with others, it spreads more.

The RSV can also easily spread from children to adults.

If you have coughing or have other RSV type symptoms and you are in a high-risk category, you should go see your doctor and have it checked, explains Dr. Daphne-Dominique Villanueva.

“We cannot test everyone at the moment – in an ideal world, we would like to do it – but we want to focus on vulnerable people,” said Villanueva, assistant professor at the School of Medicine at the University of Virginia -Western who wrote RSV studies.

Doctors’ cabinets have storage tests that can determine if a disease is flow, RSV or COVVI.

There are specific antivirals for flu and COVID-19 but not for RSV. The trick is to be tested early, even to exclude RSV; The beginning of cocvid or influenza antivirals can immediately shorten while you are sick and prevent the virus from progressing towards something more serious.

With RSV, treatment is what is called support care: drink a lot of liquids. Rest real. Stay at home so as not to spread it. Wear a mask around others in your home.

If you start to whistle and feel out of breath, Falsey said, it would be clear signals that you should see a doctor or maybe even take you quickly to the emergency room. In hospital, they can give you additional oxygen if necessary.

There is no protection against a vaccine for RSV, but that could change by next season. In the United States, there are four RSV vaccines that could be approached by the FDA exam, and more than a dozen trials. Some are designed to protect infants and some are tested in the elderly.

“Since we have very limited ways to treat it effectively, you should do everything you can to avoid getting it in the first place,” said Villanueva.

Protective measures for this busy RSV season will seem familiar: wash your hands frequently, disinfect surfaces and wear a mask in overcrowded areas.

“You may want to postpone this visit for a week to see your grandchildren, or you may want to wear a mask if you go to a crowded place,” said Falsey. “Masks and hand washing work. I know that people are somehow too much, but if you are a fragile person or if you know that you have underlying medical conditions, when we know that RSV is booming, you should do these things and be cautious around children who are actively sick. All this helps. ”