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How many of you know the (non-vaccinated) Covid hospitalization rate without googling it?

kshama2001
kshama2001 Posts: 27,849 Member
I ask because a recent Bill Maher episode made a big deal about people getting this wrong, and more importantly, an anti vax site, to which I will not link, is using this as a talking point.

Was the (non-vaccinated) Covid hospitalization rate widely discussed? I've had the death rate in my head for a year but my impression is that the hospitalization rate was not covered nearly as much, and I did not have that number in my head at all.

I am familiar with the rate of vaccinated people needing hospitalization - 0. (0.0005% to be precise, which is still 0 for purposes of this discussion, but as an anecdote it would stink.)

My anti-vax aunt sent me the link to the anti vax site without commentary and I'm deciding how or if to respond.
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Replies

  • 33gail33
    33gail33 Posts: 1,155 Member
    edited April 2021
    I think it might be around 15%? But I'm not sure because it is kind of hard to find the info - I was looking for it a while back. They generally show it by age group and not overall.
    And yeah I was looking at it because our hospitals were overwhelmed and I was afraid that I might need care I couldn't access. Our hospitals are again overwhelmed (3 months later and even worse than last time), but now I am vaccinated so my worry is more for my kids in their 20's & 30's this time.
  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,899 Member
    Not the rate, because I think initially there wasn't enough testing to know how many people even had covid. The number of people hospitalized was discussed a lot -- one of the key numbers you heard along with positivity rate, deaths, and new cases. Also ICU beds available and so on.

    At some point I stopped knowing all those numbers since it just became too much.

    I don't know the rate now.

    My state currently has 25% of ICU beds available, with about 15% of those in use occupied by those with covid.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,849 Member
    edited April 2021
    Ah, the coverage about people being left to die because the hospitals were overrun is probably why people think the number is higher than it is, but that's probably just a lack of excess ICU beds, and the whole point about the need to flatten the curve. (And also lack of reporting this specific stat.)

    Here's the Bill Maher segment:

    https://youtu.be/Qp3gy_CLXho
  • rheddmobile
    rheddmobile Posts: 6,840 Member
    To be fair, he is cherry picking that statistic. The truth is no one knows the answer because no one knows how many asymptomatic cases are missed. In the early days of the pandemic the OFFICIAL INFORMATION was that 20% of cases resulted in hospitalization. I don’t know who says what at the present time but I do know his answer is not the only one out there, it’s not undisputed, and it’s not even a fact - it’s always a guesstimate based on a model.
  • lynn_glenmont
    lynn_glenmont Posts: 9,950 Member
    It never seemed like a terribly pertinent statistic to me, given that it would be affected by overall incidence of the disease and availability of ICU beds. That is, the degree of illness that would merit hospitalization is going to be depend on how many people there are who are sicker than you. I kept a much closer eye on deaths versus recovered cases.
  • 33gail33
    33gail33 Posts: 1,155 Member
    It never seemed like a terribly pertinent statistic to me, given that it would be affected by overall incidence of the disease and availability of ICU beds. That is, the degree of illness that would merit hospitalization is going to be depend on how many people there are who are sicker than you. I kept a much closer eye on deaths versus recovered cases.

    See I think that hospitalization rates are pertinent - because if the hospitals are full and the hospitalization rate is say 10%, then if those 10% can't access hospital care wouldn't the death rate go up?
    I guess I am assuming that those who require hospitalization would die without it - not sure if that is a valid assumption or not.
    When the hospitals are full (like they are here now our ICUs are over capacity) I get real nervous about getting sick.
  • lemurcat2
    lemurcat2 Posts: 7,899 Member
    My stats I watch have been positivity rate (I think it helps indicate if the state/city/area is question is testing enough that the case numbers are meaningful, and once testing is more consistent I think increases and decreases can be informative, and it can be informative when comparing across times and places) and then (of course) deaths.
  • Thoin
    Thoin Posts: 942 Member
    Yes, because I went to health sites from the state to look at numbers and not random news articles.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,879 Member
    Not sure of an exact number...I watched our local hospitalization rate pretty closely because NM has pretty minimal ICU capacity. We only have four hub hospitals in the state with ICU capacity. We were over capacity back in November/December/January and has since come down which I would attribute greatly to NM's really good vaccine distribution.

    I'm not aware of NM ever getting to a point of turning people away to go die...but we did have beds in the hallways and we were sending people to other states, especially those in the more rural areas that border Tx, Co, and Az. We had and continue to have some of the strictest restrictions in the country which is largely due to our general lack of hospital availability and how easily they filled up with COVID...another issue was length of stay...those admitted with COVID tended to stay far longer than I generally see for ICU.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,849 Member
    threewins wrote: »
    How to respond to your anti-vax aunt? My suggestion: don't. You can't convince her. Ignore her comments about vaccination. People who are antivax think in a way that logic can't correct. All you're going to do is frustrate yourself and possibly alienate yourself from your aunt.

    Not responding is very good advice, which I would give to anyone, but am not taking, lol. I'm not going to try to convince her though - I do realize that is pointless. I want her to know where I stand so she will stop talking to me about it, like she did with her 9/11 Zeitgeist nonsense.

    As I said, she just sent me a link without commentary to the anti vax site which summarized the Bill Maher piece. I drew inspiration from the first three responses on this thread and responded:

    "I saw the segment. What specifically are you referring to?

    People probably think the (non-vaccinated) hospitalization rate is higher than it is because of all the news stories last year about people being left to die because of lack of ICU beds. I had to stop watching the news when it was showing mobile morgue trucks in NY and CA. I wouldn't call that "panic porn" though - it was a real issue of lack of capacity to handle a surge in need for ICU beds, which was the whole point of flattening the curve by lockdowns/implementing social distancing, etc., which Bill Maher has been irresponsibly complaining about for some time.

    Also, the (non-vaccinated) hospitalization rate wasn't broadly covered, and when it was covered, tended to be broken down by age group rather than gen pop."
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 33,907 Member
    My state has a very good graphic-heavy covid webpage and the hospitalizations have been part of the epidemiologic curve graph since the start.

    Of course, living in the land of Microsoft and University of Washington may help with that really informative website.
  • NVintage
    NVintage Posts: 1,463 Member
    edited April 2021
    I consider myself an Independent, and I knew it! I so agree with Mahar about the news. What is up with cringey closeups of the shot going into arms every 2 minutes? Some days I depress myself watching world news all day, but most the time I just check in with the covid 19 tracker and watch Dr. John Campbell on youtube. Does anyone know why death rates so much higher in some places for April, though?(in US) I know about the new variants and spring break, but it's really a huge increase some places...
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,849 Member
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    threewins wrote: »
    How to respond to your anti-vax aunt? My suggestion: don't. You can't convince her. Ignore her comments about vaccination. People who are antivax think in a way that logic can't correct. All you're going to do is frustrate yourself and possibly alienate yourself from your aunt.

    Not responding is very good advice, which I would give to anyone, but am not taking, lol. I'm not going to try to convince her though - I do realize that is pointless. I want her to know where I stand so she will stop talking to me about it, like she did with her 9/11 Zeitgeist nonsense.

    As I said, she just sent me a link without commentary to the anti vax site which summarized the Bill Maher piece. I drew inspiration from the first three responses on this thread and responded:

    "I saw the segment. What specifically are you referring to?

    People probably think the (non-vaccinated) hospitalization rate is higher than it is because of all the news stories last year about people being left to die because of lack of ICU beds. I had to stop watching the news when it was showing mobile morgue trucks in NY and CA. I wouldn't call that "panic porn" though - it was a real issue of lack of capacity to handle a surge in need for ICU beds, which was the whole point of flattening the curve by lockdowns/implementing social distancing, etc., which Bill Maher has been irresponsibly complaining about for some time.

    Also, the (non-vaccinated) hospitalization rate wasn't broadly covered, and when it was covered, tended to be broken down by age group rather than gen pop."

    How my husband convinced his anti-vax father was to tell him he wouldn’t talk to him until he had the vaccine, because he couldn’t be bothered breaking his heart over someone who didn’t want to live. Then when his father called he would say, “have you been vaccinated yet?” And hang up on him. It took three calls but it worked.

    I love it! I'm guessing your FIL was recently vax hesitant? My aunt has been anti-vax for decades and is deeply entrenched in her position, like an imbedded tick.
  • NVintage
    NVintage Posts: 1,463 Member
    NVintage wrote: »
    I consider myself an Independent, and I knew it! I so agree with Mahar about the news. What is up with cringey closeups of the shot going into arms every 2 minutes? Some days I depress myself watching world news all day, but most the time I just check in with the covid 19 tracker and watch Dr. John Campbell on youtube. Does anyone know why death rates so much higher in some places for April, though?(in US) I know about the new variants and spring break, but it's really a huge increase some places...

    nevermind, I was looking at it by county and the death rates were really confusing, but I think that it just took this long for the death from the holiday season to show up...
    My mom won't get it, and while I'm not judging your approach.. I just tell her that it's her choice, but pointed out that we'd be able to get together more and tried to explain how rare fatalities are from vaccines. I think that once more people get the vaccines, especially once it's deemed safe for kids, a lot of people will feel more comfortable with it.
    kshama2001 wrote: »
    threewins wrote: »
    How to respond to your anti-vax aunt? My suggestion: don't. You can't convince her. Ignore her comments about vaccination. People who are antivax think in a way that logic can't correct. All you're going to do is frustrate yourself and possibly alienate yourself from your aunt.

    Not responding is very good advice, which I would give to anyone, but am not taking, lol. I'm not going to try to convince her though - I do realize that is pointless. I want her to know where I stand so she will stop talking to me about it, like she did with her 9/11 Zeitgeist nonsense.

    As I said, she just sent me a link without commentary to the anti vax site which summarized the Bill Maher piece. I drew inspiration from the first three responses on this thread and responded:

    "I saw the segment. What specifically are you referring to?

    People probably think the (non-vaccinated) hospitalization rate is higher than it is because of all the news stories last year about people being left to die because of lack of ICU beds. I had to stop watching the news when it was showing mobile morgue trucks in NY and CA. I wouldn't call that "panic porn" though - it was a real issue of lack of capacity to handle a surge in need for ICU beds, which was the whole point of flattening the curve by lockdowns/implementing social distancing, etc., which Bill Maher has been irresponsibly complaining about for some time.

    Also, the (non-vaccinated) hospitalization rate wasn't broadly covered, and when it was covered, tended to be broken down by age group rather than gen pop."

    How my husband convinced his anti-vax father was to tell him he wouldn’t talk to him until he had the vaccine, because he couldn’t be bothered breaking his heart over someone who didn’t want to live. Then when his father called he would say, “have you been vaccinated yet?” And hang up on him. It took three calls but it worked.

  • lynn_glenmont
    lynn_glenmont Posts: 9,950 Member
    33gail33 wrote: »
    It never seemed like a terribly pertinent statistic to me, given that it would be affected by overall incidence of the disease and availability of ICU beds. That is, the degree of illness that would merit hospitalization is going to be depend on how many people there are who are sicker than you. I kept a much closer eye on deaths versus recovered cases.

    See I think that hospitalization rates are pertinent - because if the hospitals are full and the hospitalization rate is say 10%, then if those 10% can't access hospital care wouldn't the death rate go up?
    I guess I am assuming that those who require hospitalization would die without it - not sure if that is a valid assumption or not.
    When the hospitals are full (like they are here now our ICUs are over capacity) I get real nervous about getting sick.

    I think the percentage of infected who "require" hospitalization (i.e., who will be actually be admitted, which is what hospitalization rate measures, not those who "require" hospitalization by some constant objective measure of symptoms) will depend on the local, current incidence of disease, as will the range of severity of disease in those who are hospitalized. Low incidence of disease means those who are hospitalized will on average be less sick and stand a better chance of surviving without hospital care.

    It is at least theoretically possible (and I think practically likely) that maximum hospital capacity would be reached before maximum disease incidence in the local population is reached. Once that happens, % hospitalization won't change, but triage procedures should mean that the average severity of disease in hospitalized patients should increase as cases increase -- or perhaps at some point start to decrease, when conditions become so bad that they don't bother with those whose survival chances even with hospital care are rated too low.