13 January 2020

Key points

  • Taking a baby visiting at Chinese New Year: keep the baby warm, as the weather is cold. These gatherings are also crowded, and a baby’s resistance is weaker, so infections such as influenza or meningococcus are easily caught. Vaccinating in good time is the best protection.
  • Meningococcus is a bacterium that can cause invasive meningitis. There are six groups — A, B, C, W, X and Y. Group B accounts for 50% of local cases and over 60% in some other countries.
  • It usually resides in the throat and nose, and spreads through the air or through close contact.
  • The consequences can be grave: it can kill within 24 hours of infection, with a fatality rate of ten per cent, and twenty per cent of those infected can be left with serious sequelae — intellectual impairment, blindness, deafness, even amputation.
  • Prevention: first, good hygiene habits; second, vaccination, which is the best protection against meningococcus. The United Kingdom, some European countries and Australia all include the meningococcal vaccine in their childhood immunisation programmes. Babies can start as early as 2 months old and can complete the course by the age of one.
  • If the baby is unwell after the visits, take them to a doctor promptly.