All tagged counting covid

The doctors are right: data shows young people aren't dying of Covid-19

@back2facts wire

Cases are exploding in the Sunbelt and Midwest, but they’re largely in young people. Look at the latest data on Florida and California.

In Florida, no one has died under the age of 4. In California, no one has died under the age of 17.

And hospitalizations are holding steady in Florida. No huge spikes in number of ICU patients, and while some hospitals have very low vacancy in the ICU, each county has other hospitals that can handle the demand. Miami-Dade, the hardest-hit county, has about 1,000 beds ready to convert to intensive care if needed.

In Florida, 45 percent of all Covid deaths were of patients or health care workers in long-term care facilities. In California, 37 percent of all Covid deaths were from those in long-term care facilities.

Are California cases exploding? Look at the data

The county where Covid-19 cases have been consistently highest, Los Angeles, has grown in ICU patients by only 3 percent; but sparsely populated counties have experienced double-digit daily growth in ICU occupied beds. Make sure you know the raw numbers of occupied ICU beds, though. They’re extremely low, since some of these counties have never had an ICU patient. One county, Yolo, has a total of five Covid-19 patients, with the previous day’s admission going from zero to 4 patients between June 23 and June 24. That’s an increase of 400 percent while the raw number of serious cases is extremely low. Still, it’s not nothing, and those four people could have had contact with several other people in these counties.

The raw number of ICU bed use is at an all-time high, at 1,268 in the state. That number has held steady between 1,000 and 1,100 through some of April, plus May and June.