WHO: Systems need to be ready for flu season

It has been suggested the flu season may be worse than the previous two years, when people were still largely adopting preventative measures to avoid Covid-19 and social distancing and mask wearing may have kept many flu cases at bay.

The European arm of the World Health Organisation (WHO) said it is too early to predict whether the UK could face a bad flu season but said health systems need to be ready.

It also predicted a “surge” in Covid-19 cases as it urged at-risk groups to ensure they have had a second booster shot.

“With autumn and winter approaching, we anticipate a surge in (Covid-19) cases – with or without a resurgence of seasonal influenza in Europe,” said WHO’s regional director for Europe, Dr Hans Kluge.

He added: “People stabilised their lives without actually stabilising the pandemic.”

Asked whether the southern hemisphere’s flu season could predict the UK and Europe’s impending flu season, Dr Catherine Smallwood, WHO Europe’s senior emergency officer, told a press briefing: “We can’t speak with any certainty because each region and each country has its own specificities, but we have looked quite closely at the flu season in the southern hemisphere.

“Looking at countries such as Australia, where they saw quite early and a sharp increase in influenza in the season that did contribute some pressures, also in Latin America, we saw some pressures on health systems.”

She added: “But we don’t know what’s going to come.

“What we do know is that it’s likely that the preventive measures that have really kept seasonal flu at bay won’t be in place in the same way that they were in 2020 and 2021.

“So there will likely be an interplay between the different viruses.”