Introduction

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), remains a global pandemic and public health concern 1. Despite the rollout of vaccination programs and implementation of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), the number of infected cases kept rising rapidly particularly after the emergence of the delta variant and recently, the emergence of the omicron variant. Globally, as of March 17, 2022, there have been over 460 million COVID-19 cases and over 6 million deaths 2.
Both influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) are the most common respiratory viruses mainly affecting young children and older adults, especially in low and middle income countries (LMICs)3–7. Globally, it is estimated that in the year of 2016, influenza and RSV were associated with 39 and 25 million acute lower respiratory infection episodes, and 58,000 and 77,000 deaths, respectively 8. In most temperate regions, influenza and RSV normally circulates in autumn and winter months9. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the activity of both viruses was low early on due to the large-scale implementation of NPIs but then the resurgence of RSV epidemic was observed in a number of countries globally since late 202010, followed by the resurgence of influenza epidemic in the winter of 2021 11. While there is no doubt that the comeback of influenza and RSV will pose greater pressures on health-care providers who are already over-stretched in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is not yet known for individual COVID-19 patients, whether co-infection of influenza or RSV could further increase their clinical severity.
In the present study, we aimed to systematically and critically review the existing evidence on the impact of co-infection with influenza or RSV on disease severity in COVID-19 patients.