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Sasko Lazarov

Number of patients with Covid in hospital but admitted for other reasons close to 30% - CMO

The HSE is to provide the health minister with details about the patient types included in the Covid hospitalisation numbers.

THE NUMBER OF patients with Covid-19 in hospital but who have been admitted for other reasons is around 30%, Chief Medial Officer Dr Tony Holohan has said. 

His comments come in the wake of Health Minister Stephen Donnelly saying yesterday evening that the HSE has been undertaking a “big piece of work” to analyse how many people in hospital with Covid could be classified as ‘incidental’ Covid patients.

Earlier yesterday Tánaiste Leo Varadkar had claimed that up to 30% of patients with Covid-19 are primarily being treated for other health issues.

Speaking on radio yesterday, the Fine Gael leader said, “While we have 1,000 in hospital at the moment, what the doctors are saying to us is as many as 25%-30% of those could be incidental.”

It could be somebody who has a burst appendix but also has Covid.

As recently as 30 December, Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan said in a statement that “less than 5%” of cases in hospital or intensive care have ‘incidental’ Covid. By that that definition, he explained in the December statement, he meant asymptomatic and non-infectious disease.

Speaking to reporters at a briefing today, Dr Holohan acknowledged that, using a broader definition, the figure of people in hospital who have tested positive but who are not being treated for Covid primarily could be higher.

Dr Holohan said that NPHET, at its meeting last week, identified the need to get a “much more detailed understanding” of the hospitalisation data available. 

“As a result, the HSE have been, if I could use the phrase, kicking the tyres a bit more on that data,” he said. 

“And yes, the HSE is of the view now that the true figure is probably much closer to a 30% figure than a 5% figure based on the work they’ve been doing over the last number of days since that NPHET meeting.”

Dr Holohan said the 30% figure would be “in accord with what is broadly bring reported internationally”. 

The CMO said the HSE research into the hospitalisations arose “because we had the concern that from the data we were getting from the HSE … doesn’t really accord with what we might be hearing from other countries”. 

“And for all the reasons I said, we decided we should be kicking the tyres more thoroughly on that data.” 

He noted that the piece of work being conducted into hospitalisations is not concluded.

“Maybe a point to make, and that shouldn’t be lost, is that if you have a patient who is in for a completely separate purpose but happened to have Covid, they still represent a significant risk to the staff and other patients, in particular, in the hospital environment,” Dr Holohan added.

Speaking on Newstalk’s Hard Shoulder programme yesterday, Donnelly explained that there are three groups of patients in hospital with Covid at the moment.

“So you have people who are not being treated for Covid, they have no symptoms of Covid, but they have tested positive. They show up in the figures,” he said.

“There’s another group, who may be being treated for Covid, but it’s not the primary reason they’re in and the Covid isn’t particularly dangerous for them. 

“And then there’s the final group who really are quite ill with Covid. They’re being actively treated for Covid. And some of them could end up in a much worse situation — could end up in critical care.”

Hospitalisation figures are regularly updated for people that have tested positive for Covid-19. However, the hospitalisation figures reported each day include all categories of patients mentioned above.

Recent reports from the HSE to government have shown that among more recent hospitalisations, the numbers admitted for the treatment of Covid alone is “way down”, as one senior health source put it, speaking to The Journal

One example cited is a person who has broken their leg, presented to hospital, and subsequently tested positive for Covid-19.

Medics may decide to give that patient some sort of treatment or medication for their Covid symptoms, which therefore means they are included in the hospitalisation numbers.

Had they not presented to hospital with their other ailment, they would never have featured in the daily figures, the senior source pointed out. 

It is understood that Donnelly has asked the HSE to provide him with as much detail as possible about the patient types included in the Covid hospitalisation numbers so as to get a better sense of what the health service may be facing. 

The reason the minister wants the breakdown is it will tell the government how many people might possibly end up in critical care – which government ministers state is now the key metric it is looking at when it comes to weighing up restrictions.

A source close to the health minster has said that Donnelly is seeking “granular” detail with a view to understanding as much as possible about the impact on critical care in the weeks ahead.

It is also understood that the minister is in favour of full transparency around these hospitalisation figure breakdowns, and is very open to full transparency around each category of patient in hospital with Covid. 

“It’s all about definitions,” said another senior source, who highlighted that NPHET defines ‘incidental’ cases as asymptomatic and non-infectious patients.

Severity and mortality

Data from South Africa, where Omicron rose to prominence, found fewer hospitalisations, respiratory diagnoses and a decrease in severity and mortality in the fourth wave compared to previous waves.

In the latest episode of The Explainer podcast, Mia Malan, the editor-in-chief of Bhekisisa – an award-winning health journalism centre in South Africa – told The Journal that admission rates for hospitals in the country peaked at about a quarter of the proportion that was admitted during delta. 

“When people ended up in hospital, they were far less likely to fall severely ill,” Malan said.

They were less likely to require expensive resources such as ventilation, or supplemental oxygen or end up in an intensive care unit. And because of that, all in all, it put less strain on our health system.
— Additional reporting by Céimin Burke and Daragh Brophy 

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    Mute Tallaght two
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    Feb 21st 2015, 7:32 AM

    I would not want to be in those towers with a fire on the floors below. Very frightening. How everyone got out ok.

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    Mute Tallaght two
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    Feb 21st 2015, 7:33 AM

    *hope

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    Mute Radu Covrig
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:12 AM

    The Torch tower caught fire. Unfortunate and ironic

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    Mute Sacha Mahady
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    Feb 21st 2015, 8:44 AM

    Wow. Another skyscraper fire that burned for hours and did not result in a pinpoint collapse. And still people accept what cr@p is spouted about what happened to tower 7 on that horrible day in sept 11. Great to hear no one was badly hurt in this fire.

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    Mute John Reese
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    Feb 21st 2015, 8:49 AM

    Did a 767 hit it though….duh no

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    Mute Paul Furey
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:06 AM

    With full tanks of thousands of tons of fuel.

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    Mute Horgay H
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:08 AM

    Re Sacha

    Well said

    Re John

    Tower 7, a separate building to the two twin towers, was a 47 storey skyscraper. It received minimal superficial damage from parts of the plane and none of this damage was structural. Apparently the ‘fire’ that raged in a small part of the building caused the whole structure to suddenly collapse in freefall within a clue of seconds. Scientists are still baffled as to how this happened. It was investigated and a model put forward as to how it happened but this data will not be released by the government despite lots of requests and no one else can recreate the findings of the investigators re this.

    Tower 7, is the elephant in the room. It cannot be explained and anyone who believes the official conspiracy theory them please explain Tower 7.

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    Mute Barry Cooper
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:50 AM

    Twin towers were engineered to take a hit from the plane but don’t let facts get in the way. Building 7 fell and no plane hit that. Any thoughts on y that one fell

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    Mute Alan b
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    Feb 21st 2015, 10:01 AM

    Ah boys ye are away with the fairies!

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    Mute Gary
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    Feb 21st 2015, 10:27 AM

    Paul, Scientific fact or Media coverage, you decide. The following information is easily found.
    Extremely high temperatures were evident before and after the destruction of the World Trade Center Twin Towers. Office and hydrocarbon fires burning in open air (~500° to 1,500° F) cannot reach temperatures in the range that iron or structural steel melts (2,700° F).
    Thermal images from NASA found temperatures at ground zero to be as high as 2,800F.
    Iron oxide and aluminum are the ingredients of classic thermite, an incendiary that burns at approximately 4500°F, producing aluminum oxide and molten iron. The carbon content of the ground zero metal indicates the presence of thermite.
    Thermal images taken by NASA and EarthData satellites show that the “hot spots” remained at the same locations. The phenomenon did not “move” across the site, like one would expect from fire as it consumes the fuel available in any one location.
    University of California professor Abolhassan Astaneh-Asl, the first structural engineer given access to the WTC steel notes, “I saw melting of girders at the World Trade Center.” Astaneh also “describes the connections [between supporting columns] as being smoothly warped: “That could only happen if you get steel yellow hot or white hot – perhaps around 2,000 degrees.’”.

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    Mute Andy Byrne
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    Feb 21st 2015, 11:36 AM

    Where was the plane that hit the pentagon? Or the field? Look at the pics!!

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    Mute James Whelan
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    Feb 21st 2015, 1:25 PM

    The difference between conspiracy theorists these days and those from the past is that today the so called ‘Tin foil hat ‘ merchants have all the scientific facts to back up their arguments.

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    Mute Sacha Mahady
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    Feb 21st 2015, 3:05 PM

    No John it did not. I would say it was hit with about the same amount of plane as tower 7 though. I’m not here to educate you. Do your own research before you talk nonsense.
    Separately the energy from the aviation fuel would have burnt out within a few minutes leaving only paper and desks to burn the rest. Computers and copiers don’t make great fire wood. Convenient that a un burnt passport which was apparently on the body of one of the terrorists was found at ground zero in near perfect condition too. The fact is that in every case possible. Everything falls at the line of least resistance. And the line of least resistance is not straight down through reinforced columns.

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    Mute Stephen Earle
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    Feb 21st 2015, 3:33 PM

    Sacha, they dont build towers with the same method of construction like the World Trade Center anymore so referring to it is ill informed

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    Mute Lloyd Hetherington
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:27 AM

    That’s what you get when you use slave labour!

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    Mute Neal Ireland Hello
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    Feb 21st 2015, 12:30 PM

    I doubt that the architects were slaves.

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    Mute Charlie Mountney
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:31 AM

    Well said Lloyd. Another ultra conservative Middle Eastern shitehole.

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    Mute Paul Cassidy
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:45 AM

    John…you implying a 767 hit tower 7? No plane hit tower 7.

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    Mute Micheal S. O' Ceilleachair
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    Feb 21st 2015, 11:40 AM

    Remember the Towering Inferno. Good film.

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    Mute Vaibhav Borse
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    Feb 21st 2015, 9:17 AM

    i didn’t know Dubai had a torch!!

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    Mute space invader
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    Feb 21st 2015, 5:47 PM

    A few less windows for the window cleaners to clean Monday morning

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