Official Statistics

National flu report summary: 28 November 2019 (week 48)

Updated 1 October 2020

1. Main points: data up to week 47, 2019

Data up to week 47 (ending 24 November 2019) shows:

• during week 47, influenza activity has continued to increase for several indicators
• the impact of flu on healthcare services is at moderate intensity levels for hospitalisations and Below baseline for ICU/HDU influenza admissions
• respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) continues to circulate in the <5 year olds in England

The full weekly flu report this summary is based on, accompanying spreadsheet of data and slideset are available from weekly national flu reports: 2019 to 2020 season.

2. Surveillance scheme summaries

2.1 Community

Data from outbreak surveillance shows:

• there have been 190 new acute respiratory outbreaks reported in the past 7 days
• 34 outbreaks were reported from care homes where 6 tested positive for influenza A(unknown subtype)
• 4 outbreak was reported from hospitals where one tested positive for influenza A(unknown subtype) and another for a mixed respiratory infection *142 outbreaks were reported from schools where 9 tested positive for influenza A(unknown subtype) and one for influenza B
• the remaining 10 outbreaks were reported from the Other settings category with no test results

2.2 Primary care

Data from primary care surveillance shows:

• the rate of influenza-like illness (ILI) was below baseline threshold level
• the overall weekly ILI GP consultation rate was 6.5 per 100,000 in week 47 compared to 5.3 per 100,000 registered population in the previous week in participating GP practices for England
• in the devolved administrations, ILI rates were below baseline threshold levels for Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales

2.3 Secondary care

Data from secondary care surveillance shows:

• hospitalisation rate observed were above baseline impact levels, with a rate of 2.80 per 100,000 in week 47 compared to 1.38 per 100,000 trust catchment population in the previous week, for England (21 NHS Trusts)
• ICU and HDU admission rate observed was just below baseline impact levels, with a rate of 0.08 per 100,000 in week 47 compared to 0.05 per 100,000 trust catchment population in the previous week, for England (133 out of 143 NHS Trusts)
• there were no influenza admissions reported from the 6 severe respiratory failure centres in the UK

2.4 All-cause mortality

Data from all-cause mortality surveillance shows:

• no statistically significant excess all-cause mortality by week of death was seen overall and by age group in England in week 47
• in the devolved administrations, no statistically significant excess all-cause mortality for all ages was observed in Wales in week 47, and for Scotland in week 45 2019 *no data was available for Northern Ireland in week 47

2.5 Microbiological surveillance

Data from microbiological surveillance shows:

• in primary care, 51 samples tested positive for influenza (1 influenza A(H1N1)pdm09, 41 influenza A(H3), 7 influenza A(unknown subtype),1 influenza B, and one co-infection influenza A(unknown subtype) and B) through the UK GP sentinel swabbing schemes in week 47, with an overall positivity of 31.5%
• a total of 328 detections were recorded through the DataMart scheme (11 influenza A(H1N1)pdm09, 193 influenza A(H3), 116 influenza A(not subtyped) and 8 influenza B) with an overall positivity of 14.5% and above baseline threshold levels

2.6 Vaccination

Data from the GP patient, healthcare worker and primary school-age children flu vaccine uptake programmes shows:

• up to week 47 2019, in 93.9% of GP practices in England, the provisional proportion of people who had received the 2019 to 2020 influenza vaccine in targeted groups was 33.0% in under 65 years in a clinical risk group, 35.5% in pregnant women and 66.1% in those aged 65 and over
• up to week 47 2019, in 93.2% of GP practices reporting for the childhood collection the provisional proportion vaccinated was 21.1% in 2 year olds and 20.4% in 3 year olds

Provisional data from the first monthly collection of influenza vaccine uptake by frontline healthcare workers show 43.6% were vaccinated by 31 October 2019, compared to 46.3% vaccinated in the previous season by 31 October 2018.

Provisional data from the first monthly collection of influenza vaccine uptake for children of school years reception to year 6 shows 17.9% in school year reception age, 17.6% in school year 1 age, 17.3% in school year 2 age, 16.6% in school year 3 age, 16.4% in school year 4 age, 15.8% in school year 5 and 15.2% in school year 6 age were vaccinated by 31 October 2019.

3. International situation

• in In the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere, influenza activity remained at inter-seasonal levels in most countries; however continued to increase across the countries of the Western Asia
• in the temperate zones of the southern hemisphere, influenza activity returned to interseasonal levels in most countries and decreased to low levels in Chile
• worldwide, seasonal influenza A accounted for the majority of detections, with equal proportions of influenza A(H1N1)pdm09 and A(H3N2) viruses.

4. Further information

See ‘seasonal influenza: guidance, data and analysis’ for further information on the symptoms, diagnosis, management, surveillance and epidemiology of seasonal influenza (flu).

See ‘sources of UK flu data: influenza surveillance in the UK’ for further information and guidance on the surveillance schemes we use to track seasonal influenza.