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Breakthrough Events, September 15

By September 17, 2022Commentary

Remember there is a lag, so as Dave points out, this latest update goes through the week of  August 21.  It appears there may be a decline in cases, but in the meantime school started and more people went back to work, so who knows.  And there is the ongoing huge void from home testing results.  And it is very clear now from two weeks of return to trend that there was a massive data screwup which DOH is apparently just going to ignore, but which purported to show a jump in unvaxed cases and hospitalizations.  The trend for a long time has been that 70% of cases, 65% or more of hospitalizations and over 70% of deaths are in the vaxed or vaxed and boosted sub-groups.  On a population basis, considering the percent of the population vaccinated, that is pretty poor effectiveness.  You may recall, however, that when you break it down by age group, there appears to be better effectiveness among the elderly against serious disease.

Dave’s notes:

  • We noted a peculiar spike in unvaccinated cases and hospital admissions in the data released two weeks ago on 9/01/2022. This was accompanied by a decrease in vaccinated, and boosted, hospital admissions. In the new data released on 9/08/2022 and 9/15/2022, adding data for the weeks of 8/14/2022 and 8/21/2022, the cases and hospital admissions have generally returned to the prior trends. We note also a similar, but slightly smaller, discontinuity in cases for the week of 6/12/2022, and this discontinuity has not been revised in the intervening weeks and the recent spike in unvaccinated cases and hospital admissions has not been revised in the slightest in the last two weeks of new data that has been released by the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH).
  • This post is an update to the breakthrough data table and charts for the overall Minnesota population published on 9/08/22 here: https://healthy-skeptic.com/2022/09/09/breakthrough-events-september-8-2/. This week’s update adds data for the week ending 8/21/2022, newly published by MDH on 9/15/2022. As is usual, there are very minor updates to prior weeks as well.
  • The breakthrough data files are available from MDH here, https://www.health.state.mn.us/diseases/coronavirus/stats/vbt.html , in the notes under the graphic images.
  • The charts in Fig. 2 through 10 contain 3 charts for each type of event (cases, admissions, or deaths). The first chart for each type is the number of events each week, illustrating in raw numbers the trend on the pandemic for the overall population, and the impact on society of each sub-group. The second chart is the rate of events per 100k each week, displaying the risk to an individual in the category at different times during the pandemic. The third chart for each type of event is the proportions of event compared to the proportion of the population type (unvaccinated, vaccinated, or boosted). This chart helps show whether or not vaccination or boosting is effective in reducing the impact of the pandemic, by comparing the proportion of events to the proportion of the population.
  • Fig. 1: This table displays the total cases, hospital admissions, and deaths that occurred each week among the unvaccinated, vaccinated but not boosted, and vaccinated and boosted populations. The week of 8/21/2022 has been added this week. We note that the spike in unvaccinated cases for the week of 8/7/2022 has now reversed for the weeks of 8/14/2022 and 8/21/2022, returning to the prior trend. Roughly similar changes can be seen in hospital admissions, where the spike in unvaccinated admissions for the week of 8/07/2022 has mostly, but not quite, returned to the prior trend. The deaths data exhibited no spike in unvaccinated deaths for the week of 8/07/2022.
  • Fig. 2: This chart simply plots the cases among the unvaccinated, vaccinated but not boosted, and vaccinated and boosted populations each week, as found in Fig. 1. As noted, the sharp spike in unvaccinated cases for the week of 8/07/2022 has now reversed, as well as the cases for the vaccinated and boosted populations. This has the appearance that cases for the week of 8/07/2022 were counted as unvaccinated even though a sizeable proportion of the cases were actually vaccinated or boosted. Note that boosted cases are the largest category of cases, mainly due to the boosted population being the largest group in Minnesota.
  • Fig. 3: This chart displays the case rates per 100k for each group. We can see a sharp increase in the unvaccinated case rate for the week of 8/07/2022, and now the reversal for the week of 8/14/2022 and 8/21/2022. Note also a similar spike which has not been corrected for the week of 6/12/2022.          The prevailing trend since early July has been for the boosted and unvaccinated case rate to be almost identical, and for the vaccinated but not boosted case rate to be somewhat lower. It is not immediately obvious why the vaccinated but not boosted should have a lower case rate.
  • Fig. 4: This chart displays the proportion of the 5 and over population who are unvaccinated (solid purple), vaccinated but not boosted (solid blue), and vaccinated and boosted (solid gold). For each population group we also display the proportion of cases each week (dashed lines of same color). The way to interpret this chart is to compare the proportion of breakthroughs to the proportion of vaccinations for each group. Whenever the dashed breakthrough proportion line is below the solid vaccination line of the same color, then that category is underrepresented for population, and when the dashed line is above the solid line of the same color then that category is overrepresented. For the week of 8/21/22 the unvaccinated made up 29% of the overall 5+ population and accounted for 30% of the overall cases, almost exactly neutral. Conversely, the boosted made up 43% of the overall population but accounted for 48% of the cases.
  • Fig. 5-7: These charts display the hospital admissions, hospital admission rates per 100k, and hospital admissions proportions for the 5+ age group, in an identical format to the case charts in Fig. 2 through Fig. 4. Fig. 5 shows a sharp spike in the number of hospital admissions among the unvaccinated followed by a reduction with week of 8/14/2022 and 8/21/2022, with an opposite negative spike in admissions for the vaccinated and boosted. Fig. 6 shows similar changes in trend among the different groups. The unvaccinated appear to consistently have a higher hospitalization rate in recent weeks, followed by the boosted, and the vaccinated but not boosted having the lowest hospitalization rate. Fig. 7 shows that the unvaccinated were over-represented the week of 8/21/2022 (purple dashed curve higher than the solid purple curve), while the vaccinated and boosted are neutral, and the vaccinated but not boosted are under=represented.
  • Fig. 8-10: These charts display the deaths, death rates per 100k, and death proportions for the 5+ age group, in an identical format to the case charts in Fig. 2 through Fig. 4. Deaths among all three groups (unvaccinated, vaccinated but boosted, vaccinated and boosted) are almost identical for the week of 8/21/2022 (Fig. 8). The death rates per 100k are all very low for the week of 8/21/2022, with the per capita death rates for each group almost identical (Fig. 9). For the week of 8/21/2022, the boosted make up 43% of the overall population and account for 40% of the weekly deaths (almost neutral), while the unvaccinated make up 29% of the population but account for only 32% of the deaths (Fig. 10).
  • MDH defines the fully vaccinated (what we have termed vaccinated but not boosted) as those who have not received a booster after completing their primary vaccination series, and had been vaccinated at least 14 days prior to testing positive.
  • MDH defines the boosted as those who have received any additional vaccination shots after completing their primary vaccination series, and also received the booster at least 14 days prior to testing positive. In addition, booster doses were only counted after 8/13/2021, the date the CDC first began recommending booster shots.

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