Respiratory syncytial virus pneumonia among the elderly: An assessment of disease burden

Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is an important cause of acute lower resp iratory tract disease among the elderly, but national estimates of the burd en of this disease have not been made. To estimate the morbidity, mortality , and medical costs of RSV-associated pneumonia among US elderly, national hospital discharge data, vital statistics, etiologic studies of adult pneum onia hospitalizations, and Medicare cost data were reviewed. Ln the United States, 687,000 hospitalizations and 74,000 deaths caused by pneumonia occu r annually among the elderly; similar to 2%-9% of these are caused by RSV, At a cost of $11,000 per RSV pneumonia hospitalization, the estimated annua l cost of RSV pneumonia hospitalizations is $150-$680 million. Exacerbation s of congestive heart failure and other chronic conditions may also contrib ute substantially to RSV disease burden among the elderly. The total RSV di sease burden is probably great enough to justify development of an RSV vacc ine for use in this group.