Covid patients in hospital FOUR TIMES less likely to die now than in April, study finds
CORONAVIRUS patients in hospital are four times less likely to die now than they were in April, experts have revealed.
Data compiled by Oxford University revealed that six per cent of patients hospitalised with the virus died during the peak of the pandemic.
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By June this dropped to just 1.5 per cent and experts have said that doctors may be getting better at prescribing treatment to patients.
Since the end of March the number of patients dying in hospital from the illness declined.
Data from April showed that of the 10,387 people in hospital in England with the virus, 644 died.
On June 15 it was just 50 out of 3,270.
This shows that the death rate in April was four times higher than it is now.
On April 8 there was a peak of 899 people dying in hospitals in England, on June 15 the number was 50.
This is while the number of people in hospital with the virus has also fallen.
On April 10 there were 15,702 in hospital and on June 19 just 2,891.
So far in the UK over 43,000 people have died from the virus and researchers said there could be numerous explanations for the data.
When the coronavirus pandemic swept the country scientists scrambled to find effective treatments and there are now various drug trials being used to treat patients, such as dexamethasone, which have had an impact on survival.
This is while it’s also believed that more people working from home has helped stop the spread of the virus.
The researchers explained that people who are currently in hospital with the illness may be elderly or vulnerable and therefore are more likely to die from the disease.
Researchers found that there is now a greater proportion of deaths over the age of 60 compared to the peak in April.
The team had previously considered that the death rates may have been lower as younger people were being admitted to hospital, but the data revealed that this was not the case.
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The study was carried out by Prof Carl Heneghan, Professor of Evidence Based Medicine, Dr Jason Oke, of Oxford University and Dr Jason Mahon of the University of York.
Prof Heneghan said it’s “important to understand the reasons” as to why there have been less hospital deaths and admitted that further research was needed on this.
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The team added: “The reasons for the declining death rate in hospitals may be a combination of one or all of these factors or due to some other reason, we have not considered.
“In either case, further research is warranted to understand why the hospital death rate has declined so markedly over the past eight weeks.”
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