There are more reports of rotavirus infections than usual, RIVM confirms. The ‘rota season’ also started a few months earlier than usual.
No rota due to corona
The latter is probably because the number of children sensitive to the virus is higher due to the lack of a rotavirus season in 2020, says RIVM spokesman Martijn van der Wind. “The fact that the season was mild in 2020 had to do with the corona measures that were in force at the time.”
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What is Rotavirus?
A rotavirus infection is a contagious disease in which the stomach and intestines become inflamed. Symptoms of illness are fever, nausea, vomiting and severe watery diarrhea. Rotavirus infections are common in the Netherlands, especially in young children between 6 months and 2 years old.
The rotavirus is in the feces of someone who is infected. The disease is contagious from the moment there are symptoms. The contagiousness lasts about a week.
Source: RIVM
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The fact that so many children are in hospital because of the rotavirus could most probably have been prevented. There is a vaccine available, but it has not yet been included in the National Immunization Programme. The previous State Secretary for Health Paul Blokhuis has passed that decision on to the new cabinet.
Thousands of recordings can be prevented
In the years 2014 to 2019, the average number of hospital admissions due to the rotavirus was 3,600, the Health Council writes in last year’s advice. In a single case, children can die from it, which happens five to seven times a year.
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But if all children are vaccinated, 1930 to 3,389 hospital admissions per year can be prevented, Blokhuis wrote in a letter to parliament last year. And in the same letter of 15 October Blokhuis wrote that he is positive about the Health Council’s advice, but that ‘it is up to the next cabinet to take a final decision on the basis of this advice’.
‘Do our best to follow the Health Council’
Blokhuis: “Before a decision can be made about new policy, funding must be found in the budget.”
The new State Secretary is Maarten van Ooijen. To date, he has not been able to read up on the rotavirus well enough, but ‘we are doing our best to follow the advice of the Health Council’, says his spokesman Ruben van Dorssen.
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It is too late for now, but that seems good news for the coming years, in which the rotavirus may then have less chance due to vaccination. In other countries, the vaccine is already being used on a large scale and with success.
Drinking Vaccine
And yet the decision has not yet been made. “There must still be a final decision, there must be money for it.” More information about this will be forthcoming within a few weeks, Van Dorssen says.
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If it comes then, the vaccine will be for children from 6 to 32 weeks. It is a drinking vaccine, so the children do not get a shot.
The vaccine is also suitable for premature babies, says the Medicines Evaluation Board. “The vaccines protect children against rotavirus for about two years and the efficacy of the vaccines is 85 percent. That means that young children are 85 percent protected against severe diarrhea due to the rotavirus.”
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