Puig-Barberà, Joan, Burtseva, Elena, Hongjie Yu, Cowling, Benjamin J., Badur, Selim, Kyncl, Jan, Sominina, Anna, Yu, Hongjie, and GIHSN
The Global Influenza Hospital Surveillance Network (GIHSN) has established a prospective, active surveillance, hospital-based epidemiological study to collect epidemiological and virological data for the Northern and Southern Hemispheres over several consecutive seasons. It focuses exclusively on severe cases of influenza requiring hospitalization. A standard protocol is shared between sites allowing comparison and pooling of results. During the 2014-2015 influenza season, the GIHSN included seven coordinating sites from six countries (St. Petersburg and Moscow, Russian Federation; Prague, Czech Republic; Istanbul, Turkey; Beijing, China; Valencia, Spain; and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil). Here, we present the detailed epidemiological and influenza vaccine effectiveness findings for the Northern Hemisphere 2014-2015 influenza season. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]