In reply to: Where did they get those numbers? posted by mintirish
I was relying on the data from the UK in my mind and the local NY data - hadn't checked the national data in a week or so.
Deaths are still way down because the most vulnerable group at 65+ is heavily vaccinated. Let's hope it stays that way as the cases peak in the next couple of weeks.
The vax/non-vax cohorts are not the same, specifically by age. The older who were far more likely to have serious cases are much more likely to be vaxed. So the pool of non-vaxed people skews younger which inherently will have a much lower hospitalization/cases rate, just like if we compared a group of young professionals to senior citizens.
Obviously not 1-to-1 but the unvaccinated are mostly not elderly.
when we match the peak in new cases with the (presumably) later peak in deaths.
Hospitalizations may be more correlated with obesity, etc. which may be more prevalent among the unvaccinated than they are in the population as a whole. Any theoretical break in the relationship is certainly not evident in the data so far.
I assume that is a factor of vaccination rates and ages (UK vaccination rate is 75%+ for all age groups 40 yrs +).
Repeating my post from last week:
UK heavily vaccinated as well. July cases peak hit 80% of the January surge peak (7 day average cases of 46,837 in June vs 59,417 in January).
However, deaths (still rising) seem to be on pace to be less than 10% of the January surge peak (deaths are still trending up, the 8 days after the July cases peak the 7 day average death number is 71 vs 1,121 average 8 days after the January cases peak).
Vaccines may not be able to eliminate positive tests. But they do seem to be effective at minimizing hospitalizations and deaths among the vulnerable.
The majority of the vulnerable are easily identified by age. Protecting the vulnerable from hospitalization and death is an achievable goal and can be accomplished by vaccinating the vulnerable.
Looks like hospitalizations are peaking now. Cases are falling almost as quickly as they rose.
The Dutch recently caught up to the UK in the vaccination program.
based on the state's vaccinated/unvaccinated demographics for expected hospitalizations and deaths when the delta variant surge hits a state to help state hospital systems plan.
For example, Israel is continuing to struggle with delta. My guess is that the vaxxed/unvaxxed communities don't mix all that much due to religious differences, while in the NL and other parts of Europe (Portugal is showing a similar pattern) the headline vaxxed number is more realistic for the population as a whole.
My sense is that the US is more like Israel in that some of the unvaxxed communities are isolated enclaves by choice.
and there is also the question if the relationship of "cases" (as in positive test result) actually has the same relationship to actual infections in the community, as anecdotally (but many anecdotes) it seems people aren't getting covid tests for every little cough like we were back in the winter and spring.
and people who are vaccinated aren't getting tested for every sniffle like you said.
So the positive number of tests is surely not catching all the cases.