Director of Health Ronald Lam urged the public to get inoculated against the flu on Saturday, saying influenza infections have been exhibiting a "wave-like pattern" increase since June.

Speaking on a Commercial Radio programme, he said influenza A remains the primary virus type, with the dominant strain, H1, accounting for around 80 percent of infections and the H3 strain making up nearly 20 percent.

Influenza B virus infections made up the rest.

Lam said influenza infections were still high last week, with the rate of people seeking assistance at public hospitals surging to 0.83 per 10,000 patients, compared to 0.27 a year ago.

Of the 19 cases of severe paediatric influenza infections this summer, half were aged five or below and three were not vaccinated.

Lam urged parents to get their children inoculated as soon as possible, saying the risk of developing complications or severe conditions is more than five times higher for those who are not vaccinated.

With the Seasonal Influenza Vaccination School Outreach programme set to launch on Thursday, he said the response has been very enthusiastic this year, with more than 99 percent of all schools having signed up.

“We will complete vaccination for 80 schools by the end of September. For the same period last year, there were only five,” Lam said.

“We also plan to complete the vaccination for more than 99 percent of participating schools by this season, meaning we hope all schools can get the jabs by mid-December.”

The Department of Health, Lam said, has named the 14 schools that have not registered for the programme to encourage parents to turn to private-sector doctors enrolled in the government's vaccination subsidy scheme.

These schools, he stressed, chose not to participate in the outreach programme due to various reasons, such as administrative arrangements.



Edited by Robert Kemp