Quantifying the risk of pandemic influenza in pregnancy and Indigenous people in Australia in 2009

H Kelly; G N Mercer; A C Cheng

doi:10.2807/ese.14.50.19441-en

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Quantifying the risk of pandemic influenza in pregnancy and Indigenous people in Australia in 2009
H Kelly¹ , G N Mercer² , A C Cheng³
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Affiliations: ¹ Victorian Infectious Diseases Reference Laboratory and School of Population Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia ² National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia ³ Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, Monash University Melbourne, Australia

Correspondence:
H Kelly
Heath.Kelly mh.org.au
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Citation style for this article: Kelly H, Mercer G N, Cheng A C. Quantifying the risk of pandemic influenza in pregnancy and Indigenous people in Australia in 2009. Euro Surveill. 2009;14(50):pii=19441. https://doi.org/10.2807/ese.14.50.19441-en Received: 03 Dec 2009

Abstract

An increased relative risk of infection with the 2009 pandemic H1N1 influenza virus associated with pregnancy and Indigenous status has been a common finding in many countries. Using publicly available data from May to October 2009 in Australia, we estimated the relative risk of hospitalisation, admission to intensive care unit and death as 5.2, 6.5 and 1.4 respectively for pregnant women, and as 6.6, 6.2 and 5.2, respectively for Indigenous Australians. Pregnancy and Indigenous status were associated with severe influenza. More complete analyses of risks in these groups are required to understand and prevent influenza morbidity and mortality.