[undo123]

Does anyone know where to find absolute numbers on age distributions of people currently hospitalized with C19? We’ve seen enough misunderstandings of data in the news that I prefer to see data myself.

(Bonus points for “With-vs-From” data, but I haven’t been able to find that broken out in any public dataset.)

[DanBC]

It's pretty complicated.

https://www.ics.ac.uk/ICS/News_Statements/Understanding_inte...

See also the ICNARC reports.

> “With-vs-From” data

You saying this is a pretty clear demonstration that you're not going to understand the data if it's given to you, which is one reason people haven't dug out the spreadsheets for you.

[67868018]

> with vs from

There’s a very tired conspiracy that people can walk into an ER with e.g., a fatal gunshot wound, get tested positive for COVID, and then we are inflating the numbers and blaming their death on the virus.

[undo123]

Not looking to start or participate in a conspiracy, but I do think it’s valid to ask for both numbers: The number of people hospitalized (or died) who have C19, and the number of people hospitalized (or died) because of C19. Unless the coding systems simply can’t make that distinction, it seems like a no brainer to publish both numbers. The conspiracy theorists lose traction, and we get more data.

Despite this, I see precious few C19 dashboards that show the ratio. We’re lucky to see one that describes precisely what is counted as a hospitalization. We’ve had plenty of time to figure out how to report this, I’m stunned that there isn’t more transparency.

[dragonwriter]

> Unless the coding systems simply can’t make that distinction

They probably can’t, assuming that they haven’t adopted a more complex (and, consequently, probably less reliable at what it purports to represent) diagnostic categorization than is generally used for other purposes in healthcare; the usual systems can distinguish admitting and primary diagnoses and diagnoses that are neither admitting nor primary (though I don’t know that the distinction is in what is shared for public health reasons), but it can’t distinguish between “diagnosis that are part of the reason that they were admitted to or not yet released from the hospital” and “diagnoses that aren’t part of that despite being present”.

At least, that’s my understanding based on a couple decades of contact with health IT systems and the associated data models.

[salawat]

Then you haven't been around long enough to absorb all the perverse incentives there are around how things get coded, and ways to use metrics in novel and completely unintended ways.

[teslabox]

My Aunt's friend's liver had failed - I think she was going to get fluid drained off her liver semi-regularly [0], and was getting worked up for a liver transplant. Eventually she started hospice care. This woman tested negative for COVID-19 a week before she died, but the postmortem test came back positive.

My uncle (an MD) blew his gasket, "SHE DIED OF COVID", but I think really she was dying anyways. Maybe the virus pushed her over the edge, but she most certainly did NOT "die of covid". I should look up this death certificate.

The years of life lost to COVID-19 is minuscule - many deaths are simply "pulled forward" by 6 months or a year.

The deaths of teenagers and young adults who kill themselves because of the response to the pandemic are tragic [1, for example]. 60+ years of life lost vs. 0 years lost by my Aunt's friend (who was already on hospice).

[0] https://www.ouh.nhs.uk/patient-guide/leaflets/files/110215pa... says fluid buildup in abdomen is commonly caused by liver disease

[1] https://nypost.com/2020/12/08/maine-teen-commits-suicide-ami...

(minor edits)

[DanBC]

> he years of life lost to COVID-19 is minuscule - many deaths are simply "pulled forward" by 6 months or a year.

Imagine your aunt is being transported to the hospice and there is a road traffic accident and she dies in that accident. What killed her, the RTA or her failing liver?

Imagine she gets to the hospice safely, and a negligent nurse gives her a triple dose of some medication and she dies. What killed her, the failing liver or the incompetent nurse?

People seem to misunderstand how cause of death is worked out.

> he years of life lost to COVID-19 is minuscule - many deaths are simply "pulled forward" by 6 months or a year.

We know from the first wave that covid-19 was killing people on average 11 years before they would have died otherwise.