Introduction: One of the first places in the system of life values of any state is the health of the population. Therefore, maintaining public health and reducing morbidity are the most important socio-economic challenges facing it. Negative demographic trends create real and potential threats to the sustainable development of society not only at the present stage, but also in the future. This problem is especially acute today in the world, Ukraine and Sumy region, as the coronavirus epidemic has affected and continues to affect various regions. According to the WHO, in 2019 the most deadly group of infectious diseases were pneumonia and other lower respiratory tract infections, which ranked fourth in the list of leading causes of death. 

Aim: The work was to study the structure of respiratory diseases among the population of Sumy region and Sumy in the conditions of the COVID-19 epidemic. 

Materials and methods: The analysis of statistical data was conducted for 2019 and 2020. 

Results: In 2020, when the COVID-19 epidemic was declared, the total incidence per 100 thousand population compared to 2019 decreased by 9% (from 47755.52 to 43530.21), while respiratory diseases were registered less often by only 3.4% (6084 cases per 100 thousand population in 2019 and 5874.93 cases per 100 thousand population in 2019). In the structure of the total incidence of respiratory diseases increased slightly: from 13% to 13.5%. If in 2019 almost half of the diseases were diseases of the upper respiratory tract (21.2% – acute pharyngitis and tonsillitis and 23, 1% – acute laryngitis and tracheitis), then in 2020 the largest share among respiratory diseases was pneumonia (31.3%). Its share has increased 3.4 times compared to 2019 (31.3% and 9.3%, respectively), while the share of upper respiratory diseases has decreased. The proportion of other respiratory diseases has changed slightly. 

Conclusions: During the epidemic of COVID-19 infection there were changes in the structure of respiratory morbidity due to an increase in the proportion of pneumonia, namely every third inhabitant of Sumy region and Sumy diagnosed with pneumonia in respiratory diseases.