The vast majority of New Yorkers who’ve been hospitalized with COVID since January did not receive a vaccination shot before seeking treatment, new statistics from the city revealed Wednesday.
From Jan. 17 to Aug. 7, nearly 97% of people hospitalized in the city with COVID had not been inoculated. More than 97% of people who died from the virus since January hadn’t received the vaccine, city data shows.
In stark contrast, a minuscule .02% of fully vaccinated New Yorkers had to be hospitalized for COVID within the same time frame. About 3% of those hospitalized received only one vaccine dose.
“The bottom line is the vaccine overwhelmingly works in the things we care about the most, which is stopping people from being hospitalized, stopping people from getting the most severe illnesses, and certainly, most importantly protecting lives.” Mayor de Blasio said Wednesday morning. “What the data proves is that breakthrough cases are incredibly rare.”
He noted that only one-third of one percent of New Yorkers who’d been vaccinated have tested positive for COVID since January.
De Blasio has said repeatedly over the last few months that vaccines are the cornerstone to the city’s fight against COVID. This week, he and top health officials announced that all staff working in public schools would be required to get their first shots by Sept. 27, and he’s hinted at expanding such a mandate to other city workers, including the NYPD, whose vaccination rate is one of the lowest among city agencies.
The city is also offering $100 incentives to people who haven’t yet been vaccinated to come in to get their jabs. And on Wednesday, de Blasio announced a new promotion aimed at kids: Marvel Comics is now offering an “exclusive” issue of The Avengers to children 12 and older who get their shot.
The promotions and the new mandates come as the highly contagious delta variant of the virus has led to an increase in people testing positive, both in the city and throughout the U.S.
And while so-called “breakthrough” cases — instances of vaccinated people testing positive for COVID — are rare, city Health Commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi acknowledged Wednesday that there has been a slight uptick. Still, he stressed that the best protection is vaccination.
“Here’s the common sense, bottom-line: vaccines keep you alive and out of the hospital,” he said. “Now is the time to keep going and extend the protection of vaccination as far as we possibly can.”
The city’s hospitalization data shows that most of the people being treated for COVID since the delta variant became more prevalent in June were those who hadn’t been fully vaccinated. On Aug. 7, 32,035 people who had received only one or no shots for COVID were hospitalized for the virus. That same day, only 1,042 vaccinated people were being treated in hospitals for it.
Dr. Mitchell Katz, president of the city’s Health + Hospitals network, said that what he’s seen on the ground in hospitals anecdotally supports the city’s data.
“While we have a lot of positive swabs among people who are vaccinated, all of the sick patients that we have — practically everyone — is somebody who is unvaccinated,” he said.
