Official Statistics

National flu report summary: 9 January 2020 (week 2)

Updated 1 October 2020

1. Main points: data up to week 1, 2020

Data up to week 1 (ending 5 January 2020) shows:

• during week 1, allowing for New Year reporting breaks, influenza activity has remains high but is decreasing across some indicators
• the impact of flu on healthcare services continues to be at moderate intensity levels for hospitalisations and ICU/HDU influenza admissions
• the Department of Health & Social Care has issued an alert on the prescription of antiviral medicines by GPs
• the available updated data in this report should be interpreted with caution due to delays in reporting during the New Year period

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 160 new acute respiratory outbreaks reported in the past 10 days
• 133 outbreaks were reported from care homes where 45 tested positive for influenza A
• 25 outbreaks were reported from hospitals where 22 tested positive for influenza A
• the 2 remaining outbreaks were reported from the Other settings category where one tested positive for influenza A

2.2 Primary care

Data from primary care surveillance shows:

• the rate of influenza-like illness (ILI) was above baseline threshold level
• the overall weekly ILI GP consultation rate was 16.6 per 100,000 in week 1 compared to 12.9 per 100,000 registered population in the previous week in participating GP practices for England
• in the devolved administrations, ILI rates were at baseline levels Scotland, low levels in Northern Ireland and moderate levels for Wales for week 1

2.3 Secondary care

Data from secondary care surveillance shows:

• hospitalisation rate observed continues to be at moderate intensity levels, with a rate of 4.42 per 100,000 in week 1 compared to 6.23 per 100,000 trust catchment population in the previous week, for England (20 NHS Trusts)
• ICU and HDU admission rate observed was at moderate intensity levels, with a rate of 0.37 per 100,000 in week 52 compared to 0.40 per 100,000 trust catchment population in the previous week, for England (137 out of 143 NHS Trusts)
• there was one new influenza confirmed admission (1 influenza A(H3N2)) 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 1
• in the devolved administrations, no statistically significant excess all-cause mortality for all ages was observed in Wales and Northern Ireland in week 1 2020; excess was noted for Scotland in week 51 2019

2.5 Microbiological surveillance

Data from microbiological surveillance shows:

• in primary care, 51 samples tested positive for influenza (4 influenza A(H1N1)pdm09, 41 influenza A(H3), 3 influenza A(not subtyped) and 3 influenza B) through the UK GP sentinel swabbing schemes in week 1, with an overall positivity of 38.6%
• a total of 712 detections were recorded through the DataMart scheme (42 influenza A(H1N1)pdm09, 419 influenza A(H3), 223 influenza A(not subtyped) and 28 influenza B) with an overall positivity of 18.8% 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 1 2020, in 94.7% of GP practices in England, the provisional proportion of people who had received the 2019 to 2020 influenza vaccine in targeted groups was 41.0% in under 65 years in a clinical risk group, 41.4% in pregnant women and 70.7% in those aged 65 and over
• up to week 1 2020, in 93.8% of GP practices reporting for the childhood collection the provisional proportion vaccinated was 37.7% in 2 year olds and 37.6% in 3 year olds

Provisional data from the second monthly collection of influenza vaccine uptake by frontline healthcare workers show 61.5% were vaccinated by 30 November 2019, compared to 61.0% vaccinated in the previous season by 30 November 2018

Provisional data from the second monthly collection of influenza vaccine uptake for children of school years reception to year 6 shows 46.4% in school year reception age, 45.8% in school year 1 age, 45.0% in school year 2 age, 43.7% in school year 3 age, 43.2% in school year 4 age, 41.3% in school year 5 and 39.7% in school year 6 age were vaccinated by 30 November 2019

3. International situation

• in the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere, influenza activity and respiratory illness indicators continued to increase in most countries
• in the temperate zones of the southern hemisphere, influenza activity returned to interseasonal levels
• worldwide, seasonal influenza A(H3N2) viruses accounted for the majority of detections.

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.