RS maintains leadership in the flu vaccination campaign, with 34% of priority groups vaccinated

With more than 1.5 million doses already applied against the flu (influenza), Rio Grande do Sul maintains its position as the State with the highest participation in the campaign. With 34% of priority groups vaccinated, the focus for the last five weeks of the strategy is to continue moving towards achieving the target of 90% coverage. To reach this goal, at least another 1.6 million people would still have to be vaccinated.

Vaccination is aimed at eligible audiences, such as the elderly, children (from six months to under six years of age), pregnant women, women who have recently given birth, people with comorbidities, people with permanent disabilities, health workers, teachers, among others. The campaign began on March 25th, had the Saturday of D-Day (extraordinary opening of posts) on April 13th and is scheduled until May 31st.

Among the states that started the strategy in this period (all with the exception of the Northern states, which started last November) the coverage recorded so far in Rio Grande do Sul is the highest in the country, ahead of states such as Paraíba, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Norte (all three of which have a rate of 31% to date). The national average is currently 26%.

According to data from the Department of Health (SES), in total, more than 5 million people are part of the eligible groups in Rio Grande do Sul. The campaign’s goal is to vaccinate at least 90% of children, pregnant women, women who have recently given birth, and the elderly aged 60 or over and indigenous peoples. As of this Monday (29/4), there is a record in the National Immunization Program system of 1,014,582 doses applied to an estimated total population of 2,960,034 people. In other words, the target of 90% coverage would mean at least 2,664,031 people from these groups vaccinated.

For the other priority groups, considering the unavailability of estimating the number of people (denominators), it is not possible to define a vaccination coverage target. Therefore, only data on doses administered during the campaign are available.

Check below the priority groups, estimated populations, doses and coverage.

Priority group: vaccination coverage (total doses applied / target population)

• Elderly: 38.97% (854,730 / 2,193,416)
• Children: 21.50% (136,415 / 634,582)
• Pregnant women: 15.08% (13,678 / 90,707)
• Postpartum women: 15.74% (2,347 / 14,911)
• Indigenous people living on indigenous lands: 28.06% (7,412 / 26,419)
• Total priority groups: 34.28% (1,014,582 / 2,960,034)

Other eligible audiences (doses applied)

• Comorbidities: 166,403
• People with permanent disabilities: 11,152
• Health workers: 80,615
• Teachers: 46,766
• Truck drivers: 7,686
• Armed forces: 3,146
• Population deprived of liberty: 11,118
• Public transport workers: 3,175
• Security and rescue forces: 4,740
• Quilombolas: 2,276
• Indigenous people living outside indigenous lands: 608
• Employees of the deprivation of liberty system: 1,772
• Homeless people: 736
• Port workers: 464
• Adolescents and young people in socio-educational measures: 164

Source: Ministry of Health panel

Increase in cases of hospitalizations and deaths in 2024

SES data continues to indicate the growth in circulation of the influenza virus since the beginning of 2024, in a different pattern to the same period in 2023.

Surveillance of cases of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndromes (SRAG) indicates, as of April 20, the record of 398 hospitalizations due to influenza and 33 deaths. In the same period last year (first 16 weeks of the year), there were 176 hospitalizations and 21 deaths.