"Avoid close contact with sick people, wash your hands frequently, avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth, follow good respiratory hygiene and cough etiquette" these are the measures indicated to prevent contagion from respiratory syncytial virus by the Ministry of Health in a circular signed by the Director General of Prevention, Francesco Vaia, and based on the recommendations of the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control, ECDC.
The respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is "a highly transmissible virus that causes annual epidemics during autumn and winter in temperate climates", we read in the circular, and is "the leading cause of bronchiolitis and therefore of hospitalization in children under the year of life, acute respiratory infections" and asthmatic bronchitis in children, adolescents and young adults, as well as exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in adults and the elderly; in the latter it can also be responsible for interstitial pneumonia with acute respiratory distress syndrome.
The World Health Organization estimates that this virus causes 33 million acute lower respiratory tract infections worldwide every year, with more than 3 million hospitalizations and 59,600 deaths in children under 5 years of age and 1.4 million hospitalizations and 27,300 deaths in children younger than 6 months. The ECDC indicates that in Europe, Norway and the United Kingdom, the respiratory syncytial virus is responsible for the hospitalization of approximately 213 thousand children under five years of age, some of whom require intensive care, and approximately 158 thousand adults.
In addition to non-pharmacological prevention measures, the ministry's circular indicates that "vaccines and monoclonal antibodies are also available today". Of the latter, palivizumab is used in Italy, for preterm births and children at high risk, and nirsevimab, for newborns and "infancy children during their first RSV season. Finally, an adjuvanted recombinant vaccine is available for for adults and a bivalent recombinant for adults and pregnant women.
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