An outbreak of a respiratory infection that can be deadly to infants and small children has led Children's Hospital in Winnipeg to develop contingency plans to transfer patients with the illness to other wards or hospitals.

All eight beds at the hospital's pediatric intensive care unit are occupied by children with symptoms of Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), said Dr. Cheryl Greenberg of the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority.

Children's Hospital in Winnipeg has developed contingency plans to deal with patients infected with Respiratory Syncytial Virus.
(CBC)

"Seven of these children are intubated, which means they are hooked up to a machine that helps move air in and out of their lungs," she said. 

"Of these seven children who are intubated, five are known to have the RSV infection and most of these are children younger than six months of age."

RSV is the most common cause of bronchiolitis and pneumonia among children under one year of age. It infects the small airways in the lungs and can be fatal in babies and small children.

"Some of the very young children, once they're intubated, do require to be intubated probably for about a week as their illness runs its course," said Greenberg.

The hospital expects to be able to remove children from the intensive care unit on a daily basis, leaving room for others, she added.

"If we do have difficulties in keeping beds vacated in our pediatric intensive care, and currently we are not, then we certainly have contingency plans," Greenberg said.

An infant from Thompson, Man., with a suspected case of RSV was transported to a hospital in Edmonton on Friday, the Winnipeg Free Press reported.

Two other infants who tested positive for the infection are in isolation at Winnipeg's St. Boniface General Hospital, the paper said.

"It's a common virus and every year we normally get a certain number of cases," Greenberg told CBC News. "But this year we've had a cluster of cases, beginning before Christmas time."

The infection is most often spread through coughing and sneezing. Adults usually develop a resistance to RSV after repeated exposure.