Thursday 26 March, 2020
In New York City, 95% of the nearly 200 deaths from coronavirus in New York City had underlying health conditions, although nearly half were under the age of 75, according to data released Tuesday by the department of health. city.
Deaths, as well as data on cases and hospitalizations, emulate patterns seen in other cities with major outbreaks. New York City was registering more than 15,000 Covid-19 cases as of 5 p.m. Tuesday, the largest outbreak in the United States.
Deaths are likely to increase substantially as some newly diagnosed patients worsen, although most will recover. The city has increased its care capacity to cope with the projected strong increase in patients.
While much of the concern about the virus has focused on the elderly, data from New York shows that a significant number of hospitalized people are in slightly younger age groups. 20% of patients diagnosed between 45 and 64 years of age have been hospitalized, as have 33% of patients between 65 and 74 years. In the group of 75 years or more, half of the diagnosed patients have been hospitalized.
Some of the underlying conditions are common, such as diabetes, asthma, high blood pressure, and heart disease. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2015, 9.4% of Americans had diabetes. Also, about half of all adults had some degree of high blood pressure, according to another CDC report.
The data is similar to that of Italy, where 99% of the patients who have died in the widespread outbreak that hit that country had some underlying health condition.
In the four days leading up to March 24, the city has been reporting more than 2,000 new cases each day. Due to the limitation that exists with the tests, many of them are patients who are sick enough to go to the hospital, which would skew the profile of the patients and would not count the milder cases.
The city’s health department indicated that it will update the data regularly.
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