Economy 27 November 2025, 2:43pm

Covid behind most hospitalisations, but influenza is coming up in Hungary

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Based on reports from doctors participating in the surveillance service, it is estimated that 185,900 people visited a doctor with symptoms of an acute respiratory infection in the 47th week of 2025 (17-23 November), which is 13.1% more than in the 46th week. Of these, 22,300 had influenza-like symptoms, which is 13.8% more than the previous week. Since 2011, the number of people with influenza-like illness (ILI) per 100,000 people has only been higher in 2023/24.

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As regards the estimated number of Hungarians seeking medical help with acute respiraotry infection, the current respiratory season started worse than in the previous years. However, the ARI numbers have been lower than in the previous three years for the third consecutive week now.

Meanwhile, the number of influenza-like illness (ILI) is currently the second highest compared to the past three years.

The share of ILI in ARI was 12.0%, higher than in the previous three years, and a tad up from 11.9% a week ago.

With regard to the number of ARI patients per 100,000 inhabitants, we were better off than in the previous three seasons.

The number of patients with ILI per 100,000 people was slightly higher in 2023/24.

In fact, the current one is the second highest figure since 2011/2012.

The Covid-19 positivity rate came in at 12.0% when considering all positive tests (22) of the samples submitted by sentinel GPs (184) and at 12.6% when calculating with all positive tests (26) in all of the samples (i.e. those submitted by sentinel hospitals and also traditional diagnostic samples, 206 in total).

The coronavirus positivity rate retreated further from 13.8% and was lower on the 47th week than in 2023/24 and 2022/23 but higher than in 2024/25.

The influenza positivity rate remains low, just like in the previous years, and should start picking up more sharply around the 49th week. For the first time this season, two samples showed the presence of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) last week and there were two more on the 47th week. The RSV positivity rate peaked around 24% in early 2024 in the previous season.

Hospitalisations

There were 76 people in hospital with severe acute respiratory infection (SARI), down from 86 a week earlier, of whom 20 tested positive for COVID-19 (26.3%), which compares with 17.2% in 2024/25 and 66.8% in 2023/24, when hospitals admitted more SARI patients on the 47th week, 128 and 223, respectively.

Three of the 76 patients needed intensive of subintensive care, a ratio of 3.9%, which compares with 10 in the same week of 2024 and 20 in 2023 (with ratios of 7.8% and 9.0%, respectively).

Half of people admitted to hospital with a coronavirus infection were over 60 years old (10 in total), and almost 40% of SARI patients were in this age group (30 in total). About 30% of SARI patients were under two years old (23 in total).

The NNGYK also had some key data published since the official end of the previous respiratory season on the 20th week, which show a general increase in the number of hospitalsed SARI patients since the 35th week, except for a surprise drop on the 42nd week. We also find that SARS-CoV-2 is the main reason behind hospitalisations.

So far, this season is less serious than the previous ones when it comes to how many of all people with ARI end up in hospital. We were concerned a few weeks ago that the orange line might be on its way to cross the blue (or green) ones, but it turned down instead.

The patterns of the previous years suggest that the ratio of coronavirus infections in hospitalisations should keep dropping and get close to 0-10% by the 5th or 6th week of next year. In parallel with this, influenza infections behind hospitalisations should start to pick up before the end of the year or early 2026. And then there's the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) to consider.

This is how the pathogens 'swapped places' as the main reason behind hospitalisations last year.

And this is how they have been changed in the current and past three seasons of respiratory infections. (Note that the the RSV was not reported to be behind any hospitalisation until the 47th week in 2024 and the 49th week in 2023, and that's why the orange line remains at 0% on that graph.)

Age breakdown

Half of people seeking medical help with an acute respiratory infection (ARI) in week 47 were children aged up to 14 (almost 92,600), up from around 73,000 or 44.5% a week earlier. About than a quarter (45,000) were aged 15–34.

The graphs below show a breakdown of ARI patients by age group for this year and the previous two seasons.

When it comes to ILI, the most affected age group was people aged 15-34, accounting for about 7,800 (35%) of all patients with influenza-like illness, followed by the 0-14 age group (6,800 or 30.4%).