DURING the rainy season, senior citizens are more prone to contracting flu and flu-like diseases.
In order to prevent this, a non-government organization is urging older people to visit their barangay health centers and boost their immunity against dreaded diseases such as flu, especially during this rainy season.
The Senior Citizens Club of the Philippines (SCP), a unit of the Consumers-Commuters Association of the Philippines or CCAP, is concerned with the rising numbers of Filipino senior citizens contracting flu and flu-like diseases which peak during monsoon and typhoon seasons.
Statistics from the Bureau of Epidemiology, Public Health Surveillance Division of the Department of Health (DOH) show a 21-percent increase in influenza morbidity this year.
Most influenza victims, or about 40 percent, contracted Influenza B Yamagata-Lineage virus, while Influenza A often hit 30 percent of mortality cases.
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) said studies showed that people 65 years and older are at greater risks of serious flu complications compared with young healthy adults as human immunity defenses become weaker with age.
Research indicated that 70 percent and 85 percent of seasonal flu-related deaths hit people 65 years and older, while 54 percent and 70 percent of seasonal flu-related hospitalizations, particularly influenza symptoms, were observed in these age groups.
Contracting a flu especially by people aged 65 years old and older often lead to serious complications needing hospitalizations. Flu can lead to pneumonia, dehydration and worsen chronic conditions, such as asthma, emphysema and heart disease.
While the health department has been proactive in limiting and contracting the spread of seasonal flu viruses, the best protection, according to the CDC and the World Health Organization, is still the flu shot. Flu vaccination, and not nasal sprays, has been shown to decrease flu illnesses and complications that may lead to hospitalization or even death in older people.
A 2017 study showed that flu vaccination reduced deaths, intensive care unit (ICU) admissions, length of stay and overall duration of hospitalization among hospitalized flu patients, with the greatest benefits observed among people 65 years of age and older.
Senior citizens must constantly undergo flu shots because flu vaccines are updated each season to counteract the effects of the ever-mutating flu virus.
Likewise, immunity against flu viruses wanes over a year; hence, yearly vaccinations are advised to ensure the best protection against flu, especially influenza. The 2018-2019 flu vaccine has been updated from last season’s vaccine to better match circulating viruses. Immunity from vaccination sets in after about two weeks.
In 2016 the DOH launched free flu and pneumococcal vaccinations for 1,470,903 senior citizens aged 60 and 65 years old. Filipinos aged 60 years old are given two free doses of the vaccine, with the second dose after a five-year interval.
Those aged 65 years and above are entitled to receive one dose to be administered in barangay health centers nationwide.
Last year the Philippine College of Chest Physicians, the Philippine College of Cardiology, nephrologists and endocrinologists also advocated for vaccinations due to the risks influenza poses on their patients.