Increasing flu vaccination coverage could have a modest benefit for reducing antibiotic-prescribing, according to a study published Feb. 24 in Epidemiology & Infection.
Researchers from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente estimated age/diagnosis-specific proportions of antibiotic prescriptions from Kaiser Permanente Northern California for 2010-18, looking at prescriptions for all diagnoses, ear infections and respiratory diagnoses without indication of bacterial infection.
Researchers estimated antibiotic-prescribing associated with the flu by calculating the proportion of antibiotic prescribing that could be explained by weekly variation in flu incidence.
Four things to know:
1. The proportion of flu-associated antibiotic-prescribing among all antibiotic-prescribing was higher in children 5-17 years than in children younger than 5. Among children younger than 1 year, 1.4 percent of antibiotic-prescribing was flu-associated, compared to 2.7 percent in children ages 15-17.
2. The proportion of flu-associated prescribing was lower for adults older than 20, ranging from 0.7 percent for ages 25-29 to 1.6 percent for ages 60-64.
3. Most flu-associated prescribing in children under 10 was for ear infections, while 45 to 84 percent of flu-associated antibiotic prescribing for individuals older than 25 was for respiratory diagnoses without a bacterial infection.
4. "Our results suggest an overall modest benefit of increasing influenza vaccination coverage for reducing antibiotic-prescribing, with that benefit being greatest for school-age children, as well as the benefit of reducing unnecessary antibiotic-prescribing for respiratory diagnoses with no bacterial indication in persons aged over [25 years], both of which may further contribute to the mitigation of antimicrobial resistance," the authors wrote.