COVID-IHU #5
Version 2 du 30 mars 2020
Decreased mortality associated with respiratory viral infections between December 2019 and March 2020 compared to previous year, Southeast France
Audrey GIRAUD-GATINEAU, Philippe COLSON, Marie-Thérèse JIMENO, Christine ZANDOTTI, Laetitia NINOVE, Céline BOSCHI, JeanChristophe LAGIER, Bernard LA SCOLA, Hervé CHAUDET, Didier RAOULT
Abstract :
Respiratory viruses are a major global cause of mortality worldwide and in France where they cause several thousands of deaths yearly. University Hospital Institute-Méditerranée Infection performs real-time surveillance of all diagnoses of infections and associated deaths in public hospitals of Marseille, Southeastern France. Here, mortality associated with diagnoses of respiratory viruses was compared during colder months of 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 (week 47-week 11). In 2018-2019, 72 patients (0.16% of 43,909 hospitalized patients) died after being diagnosed with a respiratory virus; 38 and 13 deaths occurred in patients diagnosed with influenza A virus and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), respectively. In 2019-2020, 44 patients (0.11% of 52,624 patients hospitalized) died after being diagnosed with a common respiratory virus; 6 and 7 deaths occurred in patients diagnosed with influenza A virus and RSV, respectively. Additionally, 11 patients died with a diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2. The proportion of respiratory virus-associated deaths among hospitalized patients was thus significantly lower (-24%) in 2019-2020 than in 2018-2019 (p= 0.007). This was majoritarily due to significant decreases of influenza A virus (-84%) and RSV (-46%)-associated deaths, and was not compensated so far by SARS-CoV-2-related deaths. Fatality rate was »7 times lower in our center than for whole France.
