Senate Community Affairs Legislation Committee, , 51:12 to 54:03
The Australian CDC provides data on RSV notification trends, noting a decrease in cases compared to previous years despite improved surveillance.
Topics: Health, Public safety
Speakers: Emily Harper, Speaker 11, Unknown Speaker, Prof Zoe Wainer, Hon Anne Ruston
Yeah, you've still got five or so minutes.
Yep, that'll do. Thank you. Good morning. I've got some questions regarding RSV. And these may, I mean, some of the data from this predates the establishment of the CDC. But my understanding is it became a nationally notifiable disease on one July 2021 with a comprehensive national notification data available from September of the following year. And in July of 23, 2023, the surveillance case definition was updated to clarify the acceptance of point of care testing as laboratory evidence of infection. Since then, of course, we've seen substantial numbers of RSB recorded and for notifications. So has there been any analysis done to determine whether the increase in RSV notifications represent a genuine increase in infections or are primarily due to the increased testing and changes in surveillance of RSV?
Thank you for the question, Senator Professor Zoe Wainer, Director General of the Australian Centre for Disease Control. I'm going to hand that question to my deputy Emily Harper.
Good morning, Senator. So Emily Harper, Deputy Director General Australian Centre for Disease Control. So yeah, in 2026 to date, up to the 4th of October, we've seen national RSV activity as reported through the systems as you've articulated has been broadly consistent with the seasonal patterns observed in previous years. So in the year to date, it's 134,399 RSV notifications, which is 16.4% lower, so fewer than over the same time period in 2025. And in the first half of 2026, it was 14% lower than in the same period in 2025 and 32.8% lower than in 2024. So whilst RSV is clearly an ongoing and very significant issue, and the advent of the surveillance systems helps us to keep a better track of what's going on with RSV. What we do know is that this year we have seen a reduction in those notifications. The extent to which that's contributed to changes in data over the time.
Okay, thank you.