Southern Indiana faces uptick in RSV, COVID cases

Dec. 4—SOUTHERN INDIANA — Southern Indiana is facing an uptick in illnesses such as respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and COVID-19.

Dr. Richard Phillips, chief medical director at Baptist Health Floyd, said over the past few weeks, the hospital has experienced an increase in COVID-19, RSV and pneumonia cases.

"For RSV, I would say we saw an uptick going into Thanksgiving, and the COVID uptick really happened right after Thanksgiving, which is to be expected," he said. "Once we have multi-generational gatherings, that's when you often see the uptick in respiratory infections that are easily passed along."

As of Monday, there were 20 inpatients with COVID-19 at the New Albany hospital. Phillips is also noticing a "pretty significant uptick" in RSV among the elderly population.

There have also been "quite a few pediatric cases" of RSV coming to Baptist Health Floyd's emergency room.

Clark County Health Officer Dr. Eric Yazel said some young children from the county have been hospitalized with RSV at Norton Children's Hospital. Yazel is an emergency physician at Norton Clark Hospital.

Young children and older adults are at greater risk of a severe RSV infection. For many, RSV resembles a mild cold with symptoms such as sore throat, cough, congestion, runny nose and fever.

"RSV is pretty unique in the sense that it's a pretty ubiquitous virus, but the reality is, it really affects those patients at extremes of ages — those under the age of 2 are more likely to get it and have bronchiolitis..." Phillips said. "And those at the extreme other end of the spectrum are at high risk of having significant medical problems secondary to that respiratory from RSV."

Yazel has observed the increase in RSV cases over the past couple of weeks, and he expects to see another peak in the winter or early spring.

"We don't get the same level of data in real-time as far as RSV like we do COVID or the flu, but it's definitely in our area," Yazel said.

He also has seen a spike in COVID-19 cases, but the severity has been "relatively low."

"We're not seeing a lot of hospitalizations, ICU stays and things like that," Yazel said. "We are seeing some but it's pretty minimal right now. We've had some absenteeism in schools and things like that."

He said people need to be particularly aware of the severity of RSV for premature infants.

"Those infants tend to get very, very sick with RSV," Yazel said. "And young children in general six months and younger — it hits them much, much harder."

Both Phillips and Yazel say hospitalizations from the flu remain minimal at this point.

"We haven't seen that much influenza just yet," Phillips said. "We have had a few sporadic cases but not to the extent that we're seeing with COVID and RSV."

Yazel said the best treatment for RSV is "prevention in the first place."

"A lot of the same fundamentals that people are sick of hearing are still in place for this — handwashing, staying at home when you're sick, covering your mouth when you cough and sneeze and things like that are the same fundamentals that work for RSV," he said.

Phillips said that those facing upper respiratory infection symptoms are "best served to quarantine themselves or at the minimum wear a mask to prevent those droplets from passing on, particularly to our most vulnerable populations."

Yazel emphasizes that RSV vaccines are available for those who are at risk, including infants and seniors.

Yazel said the RSV levels are "comparable" to recent years, but they "may be a little earlier and a little more severe." He notes that many health-care providers test for COVID-19, the flu and RSV at the same time.

"Now we're getting that definitive diagnosis, which I think is nice for patients to know what specifically they have [and] what they can expect," Yazel said.