Speaker 1: Welcome to Prognosis. I'm Laura Carlson. It's day one and
Speaker 1: sixty one since coronavirus was declared a global pandemic. Today's
Speaker 1: main story. Doctors are worried that the coming flu season
Speaker 1: will make fighting the pandemic even harder, but countries in
Speaker 1: the southern Hemisphere have already coped with the influenza COVID
Speaker 1: double threat and may have lessons for the US. But first,
Speaker 1: here's what happened in virus news today. New York City's
Speaker 1: positive test rate for COVID nineteen has fallen to its
Speaker 1: lowest level since the pandemic began. The city's mayor, Build
Speaker 1: a Black You said at a news briefing that after
Speaker 1: more than two months of experiencing positive tests rates of
Speaker 1: less than three percent, the city recorded a zero point
Speaker 1: to four test rate this week. De Blasio called New
Speaker 1: York City, once the global epicenter of the outbreak quote,
Speaker 1: one of the safest places in the country when it
Speaker 1: comes to the coronavirus end quote, but he also said
Speaker 1: the city still has a long way to go. Hong
Speaker 1: Kong reported the lowest number of new coronavirus infections since
Speaker 1: a recent surge that turned into its worst outbreak yet.
Speaker 1: The numbers reinforced hopes that stringent citywide containment measures can
Speaker 1: be eased. The city has also seen a decline in
Speaker 1: the shareff cases with unknown origins over the past week,
Speaker 1: signaling that untraceable infections are dwindling. But in Greece, distancing
Speaker 1: rules have been tightened after the country we reported its
Speaker 1: highest number of cases yet. People in two tourist regions
Speaker 1: will have to wear masks both indoors and outdoors, according
Speaker 1: to the government. The authorities also suspended all events and
Speaker 1: prohibited gatherings of more than nine people in the two
Speaker 1: tourist regions. And now for today's main story. Before the
Speaker 1: novel coronavirus, the world was focused on another killer respiratory virus, influenza.
Speaker 1: The flu kills hundreds of thousands of people globally each year.
Speaker 1: The COVID nineteen pandemic hit the US after flu cases
Speaker 1: had peaked, but with the next flu season only a
Speaker 1: couple of months away, doctors are worried that a flu
Speaker 1: epidemic on top of a COVID pandemic could stretch medical
Speaker 1: resources to the breaking point. Bloomberg Senior editor Jason Gale
Speaker 1: reports that countries in the Southern Hemisphere like Australia and
Speaker 1: New Zealand can be a model for dealing with the flu.
Speaker 1: It's late winter here in Australia and it's cold. Ordinarily
Speaker 1: this would be peak flu season, but this is no
Speaker 1: ordinary year. For one thing, there's been a lot less flu.
Speaker 1: Dr Mariam van Kirkoff, the World Whole Organization's technically on
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen, told reporters on Monday that we can thank
Speaker 1: the pandemic for reducing the circulation of seasonal influenza. There
Speaker 1: may be a number of reasons for this, particularly in
Speaker 1: the Southern Hemisphere where they're having their winter flu season.
Speaker 1: Many of the physical distancing and public health and social
Speaker 1: measures that have been put in place which keeps people
Speaker 1: apart may have actually played a role in reducing circulation
Speaker 1: of influenza. Unlike COVID nineteen, vaccines for flu are widely available.
Speaker 1: We also have a number of anti viral drugs that
Speaker 1: can shorten the duration of illness, and so it's important
Speaker 1: that people get vaccinated against influenza when that vaccine becomes available.
Speaker 1: That's really important because it will be quite difficult if
Speaker 1: somebody is infected with either covid or flu and they
Speaker 1: have a flu like illness or cold like symptoms. We
Speaker 1: won't be able to distinguish immediately between whether somebody has
Speaker 1: flu or whether somebody has COVID. We will need testing
Speaker 1: to be able to do that, so it could complicate
Speaker 1: the clinical picture. But there are tools that are in
Speaker 1: place for influenza, and so it is really really important
Speaker 1: that when the vaccine becomes available for flu, that people
Speaker 1: do take that vaccine. People in New Zealand hated that advice.
Speaker 1: This year we have a record high number of flu vaccination,
Speaker 1: muchm to higher than other years. This is Dr Sue Huang.
Speaker 1: She's a virologist in Wellington. I'm a director of a
Speaker 1: richer National Influencer Center from New Zealand at the Institute
Speaker 1: of Environmental Science and the Research. Sue says that if
Speaker 1: the pandemic has a silver lining, this might be one,
Speaker 1: but the covid the impact of lockdown on other respiratue
Speaker 1: viruses and that you can see it is so dramatic
Speaker 1: in temperate regions of the Northern and Southern hemisphere, winter
Speaker 1: is notorious for respiratory diseases. So he says there are
Speaker 1: a number of reasons for that. When it's cold, we're
Speaker 1: indoors more without sunlight and often sharing poorly ventilated space
Speaker 1: with others. Cold, dry air seems to enable respiratory pathogens
Speaker 1: to persist longer. Outdoors is harder for them because the
Speaker 1: sun's ultra violet radiation deactivates pathogens, and fresh air and
Speaker 1: good ventilation dilute the concentration of germs lingering in the air. Also,
Speaker 1: in winter, we have less sun exposure, which reduces vitamin
Speaker 1: D levels and that can weaken our immune systems. On
Speaker 1: top of that, cold dry egg can make the nose
Speaker 1: more hospitable environment for infections. Who says cold temperature, you
Speaker 1: know you you you have less blood supply around your
Speaker 1: nascauso area and then you don't have a good supply
Speaker 1: of those you know, immune cells. Temperature wise, it's been
Speaker 1: an average winter so far in New Zealand, which is
Speaker 1: why the absence of a flu season there is so remarkable.
Speaker 1: You have to realize the New Zealand's a lockdown is
Speaker 1: around March around April, and it is our late autumn
Speaker 1: and to really reach to our winter years and in news,
Speaker 1: even as the lockdown is, you're living in your bubble
Speaker 1: with your family and just a few people you know,
Speaker 1: and in that environd it basically you really really reduced
Speaker 1: the contact of rates, so the infect that the people
Speaker 1: could not really reach to infect the people very well.
Speaker 1: And that that's why we are seeing we have a
Speaker 1: very little for flu, we have very little of RSV,
Speaker 1: we have very little of for many different viruses. In
Speaker 1: New Zealand. The New Zealand government implemented a stringent countrywide
Speaker 1: lockdown on March that led to what was essentially a
Speaker 1: seven week national state at home order. A week before,
Speaker 1: on March nineteen, the South specific nation closed its border
Speaker 1: to almost all travelers. Public life has since returned to
Speaker 1: near normal, with the exception of the Auckland region, where
Speaker 1: restrictions have been reinstated to control an outbreak that began
Speaker 1: late last month. So says. The measures aimed at eliminating
Speaker 1: COVID suppressed most respiratory infections, but not rhinavirus, which could
Speaker 1: turn out to be another reason there is a much
Speaker 1: flu arount. Rhino is a virus really circulated all year round.
Speaker 1: At the background, you see that even in summer we
Speaker 1: can have a rhinovirus circulation. So he thinks rhinovirus spread
Speaker 1: at low levels among household members during the lockdown and
Speaker 1: then proliferated in toddlers once daycase and it's reopened, eventually
Speaker 1: spreading to older age groups. Rhinovirus causes a sore throat,
Speaker 1: running nose, nasal congestion, usual cold symptoms. It's pretty innocuous
Speaker 1: and healthy people. In fact, it may even provide some
Speaker 1: benefit in fending off influenza. Sue says. It's hypothesized that
Speaker 1: when the immune system is fighting rhinovirus, the body's first
Speaker 1: line of defense, including signaling molecules called cyderkins, are already
Speaker 1: in the nose and throat, corralling foreign invaders. Those anti
Speaker 1: viral cytocoms somehow will reduce the success susceptibility for other
Speaker 1: virus to establish in the population. You know, what we
Speaker 1: are observing is lots of a rhino going on in
Speaker 1: the country and the perhaps there's some interaction between the
Speaker 1: rhinovirus and the flu viruses, So there's some interplay between
Speaker 1: the rhino and the flu in relation the immune response.
Speaker 1: So that's another fascinating thing we want to observe. But
Speaker 1: the furtherest see what is really going on, So says
Speaker 1: France and Sweden observed a similar phenomenon during the two
Speaker 1: thousand and nine one one influenza pandemic. I asked Dr
Speaker 1: Bruce Aylwood at w H, a senior advisor, whether someone
Speaker 1: who has COVID nineteen as well as another respiratory infection
Speaker 1: like flu or rhinovirus would have a better or worse
Speaker 1: prognosis than someone who has COVID alone. Bruce said the
Speaker 1: evidence is mixed, but the risk of co infection should
Speaker 1: be avoided, especially since both flu and COVID nineteen cause
Speaker 1: worst disease and older people. Plus Berry says a coughing
Speaker 1: flu infected person may more easily spread a mild covid infection.
Speaker 1: In New Zealand's case, going hard and going early with
Speaker 1: the nationwide lockdown has beaten back to life threatening viruses
Speaker 1: over winter, but it's come a great economic cost. From
Speaker 1: the infectious disease perspective, it is really big or traumatically effect,
Speaker 1: which is a great but the economical cost is too much.
Speaker 1: Perhaps we need to learn a bit the more, something
Speaker 1: like the mask wearing better personal hygien you know, a
Speaker 1: better you know, coughing type of you know ethics, that
Speaker 1: kind of stuff potentiative would help us in the future
Speaker 1: to reduce the transmission in the population. Coughing and sneezing
Speaker 1: into an elbow, frequent thorough handwashing, avoiding mixing with other
Speaker 1: people when you're unwell, and wearing a face mask when
Speaker 1: physical distancing isn't possible. These aren't expensive measures, and most
Speaker 1: people are capable of practicing them. Actually, if everybody follow
Speaker 1: that kind of little things, good hygienes, you know, and
Speaker 1: a good habit, and and that the potential that would
Speaker 1: really help us for the future mitigating of the fluid
Speaker 1: infection year after year after year. The pandemic is shaping
Speaker 1: society in many ways, not all of them bad. Perhaps
Speaker 1: one thing COVID nineteen will teach us is to be
Speaker 1: more hygienic, to be better at protecting others from the
Speaker 1: infections we might carry, and that might prevent the spread
Speaker 1: of many other diseases. That was Jason Gail, and that's
Speaker 1: it for our show today. For coverage of the outbreak
Speaker 1: from one and twenty bureaus around the world, visit Bloomberg
Speaker 1: dot com slash coronavirus, and if you like the show,
Speaker 1: please leave us a review and a rating. On Apple.
Speaker 1: Podcasts are Spotify. It's the best way to help more
Speaker 1: listeners find our global reporting. The Prognosis Daly Edition is
Speaker 1: produced by Topher foreheads Jordan gas Pure, Magnus Hendrickson, and
Speaker 1: me Laura Carlson. Today's main story was reported by Jason Gale.
Speaker 1: Original music by Leo Sidrin. Our editors are Francesca Levi
Speaker 1: and Rick Shine. Francesco Levi is Bloomberg's head of podcasts.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to l