Crippled by COVID, now Europe faces ‘twindemic’: What this is, why it is worrying health officials - Firstpost

Already crippled by COVID-19, Europe is now facing a ‘twindemic’ — a dual challenge of soaring COVID-19 cases and increasing influenza infections, causing worry for health officials.

Last year, owing to lockdowns, mask-wearing and social distancing, the COVID-19 pandemic had knocked out flu last winter, temporarily eradicating a virus that globally kills about 650,000 a year, according to European Union figures.

According to the data released by the European centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), in December, the number of flu cases in the intensive care units surged as there were at least 43 cases in the last week of the year.

The one silver lining is that these numbers are far below the pre-pandemic levels; in 2018 during the same period, weekly flu cases in ICUs stood at over 400.

The World Health Organization (WHO) also took note of the rise in flu cases.

“The number of flu cases (caused by the influenza virus) detected in the WHO European Region was above what we would normally expect to find in the population for the second week in a row, which indicates the so-called flu season epidemic has started,” the health agency had said in its bulletin.

Europe is also under immense pressure as the COVID-19 infections keep rising and spreading at an unprecedented rate.

France, Germany, UK and other countries in the continent have witnessed record COVID-19 numbers, putting a massive strain on hospitals and medical health care workers.

Moreover, the World Health Organization had said that in the next two months, over half of the people in Europe would be on track to contract the Omicron variant of coronavirus.

The European Union leaders’ summit began on Thursday, and the second day's agenda includes COVID-19 response, post-Brexit trade talks and climate change