The growth rate of Covid admissions in Fiaso sentinel hospitals accelerates by 13.7% compared to last week, when the increase was 7%. From 7 to 28 December the overall increase was 33%. In part, probably, it is the holiday effect that affects the greater number of hospitalizations for Covid, but what the numbers allow us to observe it is increasingly a pandemic of the unvaccinated.
In December, the increase in no vax hospitalizations accelerates heavily, in case there were still doubts about vaccines. From 7 to 28 December the number of unvaccinated people admitted to hospital for Covid grew by 46%, while the increase in vaccinated patients in the same period stopped at 19%.
The report of the Fiaso, the Italian Federation of health and hospital companies, developed on 21 health and hospital facilities and 4 pediatric hospitals distributed throughout the Italian territory. The survey was carried out on 28 December and concerns a total of 1,478 adult and 66 pediatric patients.
“In this phase, we need to look less at the number of positive swabs and infections and focus attention on the hospitals that really give the pace of the epidemic”, comments the President of Fiaso, Giovanni Migliore. In fact, we are witnessing an increase in hospitalizations but far lower than the numbers of a year ago. The hospitals have prepared, in line with the requirements of the Ministry of Health, plans for the activation of beds based on the progress of hospitalizations.
“The numbers give us the picture of one pandemic that affects and runs above all among the unvaccinated and that among those who do not have vaccine protection determines the most serious consequences. In fact, the higher vaccination coverage reduces both the frequency of hospitalization and access to intensive care. This is why we must continue with the vaccination campaign and accelerate the administration of third doses which represent an important shield against Covid disease “.
Who ends up hospitalized
But let’s see the numbers, which speak for themselves: in the ordinary wards the presence of unvaccinated patients is 54%. The age difference between vaccinated and unvaccinated remains: the former are on average 70 years old, the latter 63 years old. The state of health between the two categories is also different: 71% of hospitalized vaccinated people suffer from serious diseases while less than half of unvaccinated patients, ie 47%, are affected by other diseases.
In one week, the growth in intensive wards in Fiaso sentinel hospitals was 18%, more consistent than that recorded in ordinary hospitalizations. The increase in non-vaccinated people in resuscitation compared to vaccinated is decidedly greater (21.6% vs 10%).
Who ends up in intensive care
In intensive care, the situation is much more serious, but just as clear: 71% of the unvaccinated end up in resuscitation., compared to 29% of those who underwent the vaccine. The age range in the two groups is different: for the unvaccinated it goes from 21 to 85 years, while for the vaccinated the youngest is 35 and the oldest 90.
Of those vaccinated in resuscitation, 84% had completed the vaccination course with 2 doses for more than 4 months and had not yet performed the recommended booster dose. But these are people with serious previous pathologies.
Beware of children
Maximum attention also to the little ones, because in the week from 21 to 28 December the number of hospitalized patients under 18 has increased by 46%. In the 4 pediatric hospitals and in the pediatric wards of the 21 sentinel hospitals, the number of hospitalized children increased from 45 to 66, of which 2 in intensive care, an increase of 46%.
Among the young patients, 56% are between 0 and 4 years old, while the remaining part of 44% are between 5 and 18 years old. None of the minors over the age of 5 had been vaccinated with a full cycle, because they did not have the time, as the vaccination campaign for the 5-11 year old began on December 16.
Italy red and dark red in the new ECDC maps
Meanwhile, also due to the increasingly rapid spread of the new Omicron variant (here how long the incubation lasts and what to know), Italy is tinged with red and dark red in the updated ECDC map on the epidemiological situation of Covid in Europe, based on notifications of positives in the last 14 days per 100 thousand inhabitants and on the percentage of positives on the total swabs carried out.
The whole peninsula is dark red except for 7 red-only regions: Abruzzo, Molise, Puglia, Basilicata, Calabria, Sicily and Sardinia. Last week only Puglia, Molise and Sardinia were left in yellow.
Europe is also all red or dark red: with the exception of Romania, almost all in yellow, except Bucharest, which is red, and the southern region of Oltenia, which is green, the only one in Europe, the virus runs fast throughout the Old Continent.
Our country, together with Malta and Canada, have been among the areas considered by Germany to be at high risk since 1 January: “particularly high risk of infection due to particularly high incidences for the spread of Coronavirus“, reports the website of the ministry of Foreign of Berlin.
Swabs alarm, here’s what you risk
Meanwhile, while in Italy they shoot new measures from 10 January with a de facto lockdown for the unvaccinated, continues undaunted run to the tampon, which, however, denounce some experts consulted by beraking latest news Salute, risks making us find ourselves shortly without reagents, already after the Befana.
“There is a risk that soon the reagents for making swabs and sequencing will be lacking, is a worldwide problem linked to the lack of raw materials ”: this is the alarm launched by Mauro Pistello, director of the Virology Unit of the University Hospital of Pisa and vice president of the Italian Society of Microbiology.
“In fact, if the whole world enhances its screening capabilities, there is a huge demand. For this there should not be a rush to the pad, which at this moment is not always useful – warns Pistello -. I also think of the many no-vaxes who take the test to get the green pass “.
In this regard, also to streamline bureaucracy, one of the novelties is also that in Abruzzo, the first Italian region, the green light was given to the rapid swab as confirmation of Covid positivity, without having to resort to a molecular test as is the case by law. The Department of Health recommended to the territorially competent Prevention Departments to reserve the confirmation test only for the conditions deemed “indispensable”, such as the need to carry out a preliminary assessment for the possible presence of an Omicron variant.
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