Influenza surveillance during the post-pandemic influenza 2010/11 season in Greece, 04 October 2010 to 22 May 2011

M Athanasiou; A Baka; A Andreopoulou; G Spala; K Karageorgou; L Kostopoulos; S Patrinos; T Sideroglou; E Triantafyllou; A Mentis; N Malisiovas; T Lytras; S Tsiodras; T Panagiotopoulos; S Bonovas

doi:10.2807/ese.16.44.20004-en

Surveillance and outbreak reports Open Access

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Influenza surveillance during the post-pandemic influenza 2010/11 season in Greece, 04 October 2010 to 22 May 2011
M Athanasiou¹ , A Baka¹ , A Andreopoulou¹ , G Spala¹ , K Karageorgou¹ , L Kostopoulos¹ , S Patrinos¹ , T Sideroglou¹ , E Triantafyllou¹ , A Mentis² , N Malisiovas³ , T Lytras¹ , S Tsiodras^1,4 , T Panagiotopoulos^1,5 , S Bonovas¹
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Affiliations: ¹ Hellenic Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, Athens, Greece ² National Influenza Reference Laboratory for Southern Greece, Hellenic Pasteur Institute, Athens, Greece ³ National Influenza Reference Laboratory for Northern Greece, Medical School, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece ⁴ University of Athens Medical School, Athens, Greece ⁵ National School of Public Health, Athens, Greece

Correspondence:
S Bonovas
sbonovas med.uoa.gr
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Citation style for this article: Athanasiou M, Baka A, Andreopoulou A, Spala G, Karageorgou K, Kostopoulos L, Patrinos S, Sideroglou T, Triantafyllou E, Mentis A, Malisiovas N, Lytras T, Tsiodras S, Panagiotopoulos T, Bonovas S. Influenza surveillance during the post-pandemic influenza 2010/11 season in Greece, 04 October 2010 to 22 May 2011 . Euro Surveill. 2011;16(44):pii=20004. https://doi.org/10.2807/ese.16.44.20004-en Received: 07 May 2011

Abstract

In this manuscript, we summarise the experience of Greece during the post-pandemic influenza season 2010/11 from 04 October 2010 to 22 May 2011. The spread of the disease and its impact were monitored using multiple surveillance systems, such as sentinel surveillance, virological surveillance and all-cause mortality surveillance. We also focus on the characteristics of laboratory-confirmed severe influenza cases who required admission to an intensive care unit (ICU) (n=368), and/or with a fatal outcome (n=180). The influenza-like illness rate reported from sentinel surveillance started rising in early January 2011 and peaked between 31 January and 6 February 2011. The total number of ICU admissions was higher in the post-pandemic influenza season than during the pandemic period causing a lot of pressure on ICUs. The overall population mortality rate due to influenza A(H1N1)2009 was higher than during the pandemic period (15.9 vs 13.2 fatal cases per million, p=0.087). Our data suggest that the severity of clinical illness in the first post-pandemic influenza season was comparable or even higher than during the pandemic.