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Now more people in Massachusetts hospitals with Covid-19 than at the peak of last winter's surge
By adamg on Mon, 01/10/2022 - 7:57pm
Massachusetts reported 2,923 people hospitalized for Covid-19 yesterday, a number the state hasn't seen since May, 2020, during the very first Covid-19 surge. The peak for last winter's surge was 2,048 patients on Jan. 4, 2021.
The state reported that 1,293, or 44%, of the patients in hospital beds, were "fully" vaccinated.
The state reported 432 people with Covid-19 in ICUs and 273 of those on ventilators. In the last surge, the peaks were 462 in ICUs and 299 intubated.
The state said that 92% of medical/surgical beds in total were occupied - and 85% of ICU beds.
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Comments
I'm not sure if it's the case
I'm not sure if it's the case here, but from what I've heard/read these "hospitalization with Covid" stats can be misleading. Anyone who has ever been or has known someone who has been hospitalized for whatever reason during this pandemic knows that it is protocol for hospitals to test all patients for Covid. If a patient tests positive for Covid this is factored in the the hospitalized WITH Covid stat even if one is primarily hospitalized with an unrelated illness. Bottom line, there's a difference between hospitalization WITH Covid and hospitalization BECAUSE OF Covid.
"The state reported that 1,293, or 56%, of the patients in hospital beds, were "fully" vaccinated."
And see, this is what makes me suspicious. We keep hearing that most people who are fully vaccinated only experience mild symptoms when contracting Omicron, so the 56% stat seems a bit high.
Hospitalization reporting
Changes to how hospitals account for exactly this, people who are hospitalized for complications of having COVID vs. people who are hospitalized for other things and are found to also have COVID (which likely is not requiring hospital level care to treat) have been implemented today, the reports that come out from the state that show this data won't start showing this distinction until next week.
https://www.nbcboston.com/news/local/changes-to-mass-covid-19-hospitaliz...
Bear in mind the base rate
Something like 75% of all people in MA (eligible or not!) are vaccinated, and that percentage skews strongly by age. The older you are, the more likely you are to be vaccinated (98% or higher of everyone 50+!) but also the more likely you are to have a bad case of covid, vaccinated or not.
So I think what you end up with is a larger percentage of the unvaccinated getting hospitalized, and then a smaller (but older) percentage of the vaccinated getting hospitalized.
In other words, it's extremely difficult to make sense out of that ratio without knowing the age structure of hospitalizations.
I just tested positive last
I just tested positive last week and I am fully vaccinated and boosted. It was a lot of body aches, headache, sore throat and drip nose with a lot of sneezing. I am already not sick after 9 days.
Percentages reversed?
56% were unvaccinated, 1293/2923=0.44
Yes, you're right, fixed
Never trust a reporter with math. Thanks for checking mine.
No problem, still a startling number
It's discouraging to see such a high number of vaccinated needing hospitalization, though considering that almost 75% in MA are fully vaccinated they remain less prone to serious illness. (Somebody else do that math, I just do simple fractions.) Also, I suspect "fully vaccinated" doesn't necessarily mean boosted too. New terminology is "up-to-date."
See above thread about misleading numbers
Until now, the hospitalization numbers didn't differentiate between those hospitalized due to covid vs. those in hospital for something else who tested positive once they were there but had mild or asymptomatic cases. That is changing and soon the numbers will be separated out - those hospitalized due to serious cases of covid are likely to be mostly unvaccinated.
My brother went to the
My brother went to the hospital for diverticulitis and an abdominal blockage but they covid test everyone, he was positive but asymptomatic. So he is in those numbers.
The math
On an age-adjusted basis using numbers from NYC and Seattle, vaccinated people are between 8-11x less likely to be hospitalized than unvaccinated people (back of the envelope for MA is about 10x). And 3-6x less likely to even be infected.
I sincerely hope that you’re not too disappointed. Vaccines are wildly effective and we’d be many times more fucked (don’t @ me, that’s the scientific term) without mass vaccination.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/11/briefing/omicron-deaths-vaccinated-vs...
If you want to be a little optimistic
The MWRA data makes it look like we might have reached the peak.
Come On Adam
Even CNN is now making the distinction between being hospitalized FOR Covid rather than WITH Covid. Many states are beginning to separate the numbers.
There's no reason for you to hype these numbers the way you are. Even CDC Director Walensky recently admitted at least 40% of hospitalizations with Covid are not due to Covid.
This is now an endemic disease. It is time to reduce the hysteria.
I wish you were right
No endemic disease kills 1500 Americans a day (run rate of 500K). The flu ranges from 15K-50K per year depending on the severity, HIV is around 13K annually in the US. Likewise endemic diseases don’t overwhelm hospital capacity. I wish you were right, but you’re jumping the gun.
(It would be nice if there were a hysteria index. I hypothesize that both mean and median hysteria is greatly reduced versus any time in the past 23 months. One proxy for this: number of people eating in restaurants — hysterical or terrified people do not eat in restaurants.)
Also
There are still a lot of people out there who either don't know or choose to ignore the proper use of masks. I'm talking about he ones who hang their mask below their nose. They piss me off, and I wish they would stay outside if they're going to do that. Stores still have curbside pickup, but these clowns decide to go in and risk catching and spreading COVID.
At it's nadir last summer
Pre-delta … there were <2 deaths per day in Massachusetts (57 from June 22 to July 21), which still, on a national scale assuming other states matched that rate, would be 35,000 per year, assuming the summer data could be annualized (not a lot of flu in summer, though).
Now we're at about 40/day and probably headed towards a peak of (shuffles papers) 80? Which is about what we say last winter. If the past is any fuzzy guide, hospitalizations should plateau around the 14th, and deaths around the end of the month. But omicron != delta …
We didn’t know…
… how good we had it.
Actually we did, Boston relaxed mask mandates until Delta in August.
Fingers crossed that we’re 1. so lucky and 2. recognize it next summer.
Becoming an endemic disease
YANAE
IAAE
I don't know what lane you are in, but stay out of mine. Endemic has a specific meaning - and we ain't there just yet. We will be there when we stop nuking hospital capacity and overcrowding morgues.
Even when influenza or other "endemic" pathogens cause this level of mayhem they are considered to be EPIDEMIC, not endemic.
Acronym soup
What do those mean? Google doesn’t even know.
I assume
You Are Not An Epidemiologist
I Am An Epidemiologist
It must be said
HWTAPKWTM?
Yep, and resorting to
Yep, and resorting to acronyms & jargon to impress (or show contempt for) people helps illustrate that the person in question can be subject-qualified and still be absolute shit when talking about it.
Yeah no, not quite yet
We're getting there, and getting there quickly (for better or worse!) but we ain't there yet.
Check the numbers - typo?
You're right that we're past last winter's peak, but that peak was 2428. We're now at 2923.
Is it worrying that so many
Is it worrying that so many vaccinated are hospitalized for something other than COVID but also have COVID?
Great point!
The unprecedented increase in excess deaths bears this out. No matter how hard you squint and splice the data, no matter how hard some rubes try to downplay the pandemic, it’s still a deadly disease and a pandemic.
How many of the 100,000 kids in serious condition
With many on ventilators , are in Massachusetts?
Do you mean
how many of the 4,462 (1) children hospitalized in the US, how many are in Massachusetts? Looks like 76 from that same data set.
(1) https://healthdata.gov/dataset/COVID-19-Reported-Patient-Impact-and-Hosp... [total_pediatric_patients_hospitalized_confirmed_and_suspected_covid]
She was way off
Sotomayor should get some new law clerks.
Preferably ones who dont get info from cable news.