There is no need to panic over the respiratory virus outbreak in China that has stirred public concerns, according to South African experts and health officials, who say it is not new or mysterious.
The government said it was monitoring the situation, as was the World Health Organisation, while authorities in Beijing have downplayed the outbreak after viral videos of patients with surgical masks, some visibly sick, surfaced online with reports that overcrowded hospitals are being overwhelmed with flu and human metapneumovirus (HMPV) cases, reports TimesLIVE.
However, Professor Cheryl Cohen, head of the Centre for Respiratory Disease and Meningitis at the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD), said there was nothing peculiar about the outbreak.
“This is not a mystery virus, it is a normal virus we know about and we have known about for many years. It causes respiratory illness in South Africa and all over the world every year. This time of the year, it is winter in the Northern Hemisphere – where China is. Not surprisingly they are seeing an increase in respiratory illness as we do in South Africa, in our winter,” Cohen told broadcaster Newzroom Afrika.
IOL reports that the HMPV was initially identified by a research group in The Netherlands in 2001.
But Cohen said that probably before being identified in that country, the virus had existed for many years previously.
“This virus… is not like Covid. In 2001, it was the first time it was identified, but it did not emerge in 2001. When we look back at samples before 2001 we see it has been around for a long, long time. It was just that nobody had discovered it.
“So while it might have been identified in the Netherlands in the 2000s, actually, it had been around for a long time, and is very different from Covid.”
She said at this stage, there was no risk to South Africa.
“The WHO has assessed the level of respiratory illness in China to be within normal range. In other words, no worse than they would see in a typical winter season.
“In SA, it circulates throughout the year, occasionally increasing and decreasing. We don’t need to worry about importation, because in fact, it is already around. And we’re in summer and so typically do not expect any large respiratory outbreak at this time of the year.”
“We’re closely monitoring the situation using our event-based surveillance and watching for updates,” said Health Department spokesperson Foster Mohale, who echoed Cohen in saying it was the normal respiratory season in China.
Normal
Health officials in China have described the spread of cases as an annual winter occurrence, with Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning saying: “Respiratory infections tend to peak during winter. The diseases appear to be less severe and are spreading on a smaller scale than in the previous year.”
HMPV symptoms include cough, shortness of breath, congestion and fever. Children, the elderly and people with weakened immune systems are especially vulnerable to developing complications from the infection, for which there is no vaccine.
RNA
The Independent describes it as a single-stranded RNA virus which spreads through respiratory droplets or contact with contaminated surfaces. It has an incubation period of three to six days.
Cases have been previously identified in various countries, including the United Kingdom and Hong Kong, while neighbouring countries like Cambodia and Taiwan are keeping a close watch on the situation.
Cambodia’s Communicable Disease Control Department has issued warnings about HMPV, noting its similarity to Covid-19 and influenza.
Taiwan’s Centres for Disease Control has said the virus has higher risks for children, the elderly, and immunocompromised individuals.
In neighbouring India, officials said there was no need for panic as HMPV is “like any other respiratory virus”.
“There has been news doing the rounds about a metapneumovirus outbreak in China. Let me be very clear. Metapneumovirus is like any other respiratory virus that causes the common cold, and in the very old and the very young it could cause flu-like symptoms,” said Indian Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) official Dr Atul Goel.
UK wards full
In Britain, meanwhile, hospital wards have been described as “full to bursting” with patients suffering respiratory and flu symptoms amid what a leading doctor has called the “quad-demic”.
Dr Ian Higginson has warned that half of the country’s A&E units are at full capacity because of the sharp increase in winter illnesses.
The term ‘quad-demic’ is used to describe flu, Covid-19, respiratory syncytial virus – all of which cause difficulty breathing – and norovirus.
Higginson, from the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM), described the situation within hospitals as “pretty grim”.
He told Daily Mail that patients are being forced to wait in corridors because of bed shortages, with ambulances queuing up outside. He said there was an increased risk to the health of staff.
“We simply don’t have enough beds in our hospitals for patients who are admitted as emergencies. We don’t have enough staff for those beds and we don’t have any headroom at all. So if something like the flu hits, as it has done, it makes a bad situation even worse. We have got patients all the way through our corridors because we can’t admit them to hospital when they need to be.”
He said Britain is about 10 000 hospital beds short to deal with predictable medical emergencies, and spikes such as the current quad-demic only make the situation worse.
Recently, nurses and doctors were briefed on how to treat patients in corridors. But the RCEM branded the guidance as “normalising the dangerous”.
Last month, the NHS released figures showing 1 861 patients with flu were in hospital every day – up from 1 099 in the last week of November and 402 at the same time last year.
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