Physicians yesterday urged elderly people and those with underlying medical conditions or weak immunity to get vaccinated against COVID-19, seasonal influenza and pneumonia, as the weather is getting colder.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chiu Tai-yuan (邱泰源), who is also president of the Taiwan Medical Association, hosted a news conference in Taipei to urge people at high risk for respiratory illnesses to get vaccinated.
He said that COVID-19 continues to spread around the world and flu season is approaching, which usually begins in October and peaks around the Lunar New Year holiday.
Photo: CNA
The government’s flu vaccination program was launched last month, and it usually takes about two weeks for antibodies to develop in the body and provide protection, so people who are eligible for the vaccine should get inoculated as soon as possible, Chiu said.
National Taiwan University Children’s Hospital superintendent Huang Li-min (黃立民) said that with La Nina weather system bringing a colder winter, some doctors are worried that COVID-19 and flu would peak together.
It would make it more difficult for doctors to diagnose the two diseases, as they have similar respiratory symptoms, which would place more of a burden on the healthcare system, he said.
Flu and pneumonia cases have significantly declined during the COVID-19 pandemic, so “immunity debt” — a lack of immune stimulation caused by reduced exposure to normal levels of viruses, such as due to COVID-19 restrictions — might have occurred, Huang added.
Contracting the flu predisposes people to secondary bacterial infections, especially Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumococcus), significantly increasing the risk of mortality, but getting the flu and pneumococcal vaccines have proved to be effective in reducing the risk of severe complications, hospitalizations and deaths, he said.
He urged elderly people and people with underlying medical conditions or weak immunity to not only get vaccinated against COVID-19, but also against flu and Streptococcus pneumoniae.
Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) said because of COVID-19 restrictions and the mask mandate, there were only two cases of serious flu complications, including one death, reported in the previous flu season, and that the two cases were people older than 70.
Although the local COVID-19 situation has eased, seasonal flu outbreaks remain a risk, especially as many overseas Taiwanese return for the Lunar New Year holiday in January, he said.
People who are eligible for the vaccines should get their shots as soon as possible, he added.
Asked whether the mix-and-match approach would be part of the 15th round of national COVID-19 vaccinations, Chuang said that if approved, people who are eligible for a second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine — about 970,000 people — would have the option of choosing Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech as their second dose.
As of Monday, the nation’s first-dose vaccination rate reached 76.42 percent, while the full vaccination rate reached 42.86 percent, Chuang said, adding that the CDC’s goal is to achieve a full vaccination rate of 60 percent by the end of the year.
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