CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Pediatricians are warning parents with young children to watch for symptoms of respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV.
According to the doctors at Driscoll Children’s Hospital, there has been a recent spike in the number of kids they are seeing with the illness, and coupled with the flu, it is a big cause for concern.
“Right now, we probably have 14 children hospitalized with RSV, some of them in the Intensive Care Unit," said Driscoll Children’s Hospital infectious diseases specialist Dr. Jaime Fergie. "Many times, they need to be placed on mechanical ventilation.”
Fergie said that what starts as a cough, congestion, and fever, can sometimes turn into something much more serious, especially for babies and toddlers.
“Right now we are seeing a large number of children coming into our emergency department with RSV — respiratory syncytial virus,” he said.
Fergie tells us that RSV can lead to bronchiolitis, an infection that makes it difficult to breathe. If the infection travels to the lungs, it can result in pneumonia.
“Parents just need to realize that if you reach the point where the baby has difficulty breathing or feeding, that’s the time you need to call your doctor,” he said.
RSV is highly contagious and can even pose a threat to older adults.
The best way to prevent it is to continue practicing the same COVID-19 prevention measures that kept it at bay before, including thorough handwashing.
One complication in all of this is that pediatricians are also dealing with an unusually high number of flu cases, leading to the recommendation that children over 6 months should get a flu vaccine.
“Without a doubt, children should receive the influenza vaccine," he said. "At this time, at this moment at Driscoll Children’s Hospital, we have children with severe influenza in the intensive care unit, with severe complications.”
Fergie said that the risk to our children is too high to ignore the warning.
“It is very sad because, in many of those cases, not all -- but in many -- children who are severely ill could have been doing well if they had been vaccinated,” he said.
Flu shots are being offered at local pharmacies such as CVS and Walgreens, and also at the Corpus Christi-Nueces County Public Health District, among others.
The health district clinic is open Monday-Friday and accepts patients by appointment only.
Appointments are available from 8-11 a.m. and 1-4 p.m., and the clinic is closed for lunch from noon-1 p.m.