Very little influenza in the WHO European Region during the 2020/21 season, weeks 40 2020 to 8 2021
Cornelia Adlhoch, Piers Mook, Favelle Lamb, Lisa Ferland, Angeliki Melidou, Andrew J. Amato‐Gauci, Richard Pebody, the European Influenza Surveillance Network
Abstract
Between weeks 40 2020 and 8 2021, the World Health Organization European Region experienced a 99.8% reduction in sentinel influenza virus positive detections (33/25,606 tested; 0.1%) relative to an average of 14,966/39,407 (38.0%; p < 0.001) over the same time in the previous six seasons. COVID-19 pandemic public health and physical distancing measures may have extinguished the 2020/21 European seasonal influenza epidemic with just a few sporadic detections of all viral subtypes. This might possibly continue during the remainder of the influenza season.
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