Flu-clogged hospitals may have to defer operations

Operations may be postponed as New Zealand's hospitals struggle to cope with serious cases of influenza. Photo / Mark Story

Intensive care units in the nation's hospitals are filling up, a senior health official says.

The public can expect to see some surgery being postponed around the country over the next few weeks, Dr Darren Hunt, deputy director of public health said.

Intensive care departments are facing problems in coping with patients from major operations, in addition to the mounting tide of seriously ill flu victims.

Dunedin and Invercargill hospitals are already preparing to take patients from Christchurch hospital - which has been swamped with swine flu cases - though no patients have yet been transferred.

The last time the nation's public health system was stressed like this - during the Sars outbreak in 2003 - health officials found New Zealand had little capacity to provide intensive care for infectious patients in sealed rooms with a lower air pressure than the rest of the hospital.

News reports yesterday said eight people were in the Christchurch ICU unit with swine flu or flu-like illnesses who needed ventilation.

The unit had also had to increase the number of patients from 12 to 15 and might have to send patients to other South Island hospitals.

The Dunedin hospital ICU, which has been on the redevelopment project list for many years, can accommodate 10 patients, but usually takes only six because of space and staffing issues.

In Australia, 36 people are in intensive care in NSW and five are being treated using cardiac bypass machines.

Hospitals on that side of the Tasman have ordered new machines from overseas in anticipation of a worsening of the situation, the vice-president of the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society, Michael O'Leary, told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Dr O'Leary said Australia and New Zealand now have more confirmed swine flu infections per capita than any other country: 462 per million people, compared with 158 per million in Britain and 118 per million in the USA.

Dr Hunt declined to provide a specific figure for New Zealand, and said "accurate case rate data are not yet available to compare New Zealand's rate".

Australian authorities said they had currently had 202 swine flu patients in hospital, and 83 of them were in intensive care, with some hospitals deferring major operations, including cancer surgeries.

The patients include six pregnant women, in their second and third trimesters, who are fighting for their lives in intensive care units across western Sydney, while two Victorian swine flu patients were in intensive care units this week after giving birth.

The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists today urged pregnant women to wear masks in public and "wash themselves scrupulously" after coming into contact with others, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

The college's president, Ted Weaver, said pregnant women did not have to "go into lockdown" but should work from home if possible.

"Be alert, but not alarmed - if it's not essential to go out, stay home," Dr Weaver said.

Swine flu can pass to a foetus through infected membranes in the placenta or can cause a baby to overheat if the mother is running a fever. Pregnancy reduces a woman's immunity, and her capacity to breathe properly due to compression on her lungs from the foetus.

New Zealand has recorded 10 swine flu deaths so far, but the MOH said it was only recording deaths where swine flu was a definite contributing factor.

Dr Hunt said New Zealand health officials were unable to say how many women in advanced pregnancy were among the swine flu patients who have been treated in NZ intensive care units, or how many of the confirmed swine flu cases had been in pregnant women.

But pregnant women were a group at greater risk of complications from swine flu, including pneumonia, and needed to be particularly watchful for signs and symptoms.

Pregnant women who fell ill with influenza-like illness should seek medical advice promptly - any of these patients with swine flu qualified for free doses of the anti-viral Tamiflu.

The number of confirmed cases in New Zealand - only a tiny fraction of the actual number of swine flu patients - rose to 2230, up from 2107 yesterday.

- NZPA