Cases of influenza and meningococcal in Tasmania both more than tripled last year, compared to 2016, newly released data reveals.
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It was a deadly year for influenza in 2017 across the state, with deaths in nursing homes, fit young people in intensive care with multi-organ failure, and whole wards in lockdown.
There were 3505 cases of influenza in 2017, compared to 1055 in 2016, and 16 cases of meningococcal, compared to five in 2016, according to statistics from the federal Health Department.
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Notifications of Ross River fever across the state also increased, with 48 cases in 2017, compared to eight in 2016.
There were 21 deaths in Tasmania due to the flu in the past year, including six elderly residents at Strathdevon, an aged care facility in the North-West.
Infectious diseases expert Dr Katie Flanagan, who is based at the Launceston General Hospital, said Tasmania had much higher flu rates than previously recorded, with cases continuing into spring.
“We’re not entirely sure of the reason the vaccine hasn’t worked but there are a few factors,” she said in October.
“The first is the elderly don’t seem to respond to it very well. They’re the ones that we had outbreaks in nursing homes and many of those are the age group that we tend to get complications and die potentially of complications to do with influenza.
“Also, vaccination rates in younger people are low. Children tend not to be vaccinated apart from the very young sometimes, and healthy adults tend not to get themselves vaccinated.”
Dr Flanagan said another factor was when viruses started to mutate subtly while circulating in the community.
“It undergoes a process called antigenic drift, which basically just means it’s changing, changing, changing, and eventually, the antibodies you’ve got from vaccination may not protect you against that mutated strain that’s in the community.”
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The department statistics showed there were also three cases of Q fever in 2017, compared to zero cases in 2016.
Q fever is contracted from animals and symptoms include sudden fever, headaches, fatigue, aching muscles and weight loss.
Shingles cases also increased, from 307 in 2016 to 370 in 2017. Already in 2018, there have been 12 cases of shingles notified in Tasmania.
There have also been 12 cases of influenza in the first month of 2018 across the state.
