Economy 26 August 2021, 9:28am

COVID-19: Number of new daily cases up 50% from last week

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Hungarian authorities diagnosed 180 people with coronavirus infection and one person died of COVID-19 over the past 24 hours. The number of new daily confirmed cases was last higher on 11 June. There are 93 people with COVID-19 in hospital, 9 of them on ventilator, the official government portal reported on Thursday.

The 180 new cases marks a 46% weekly growth which clearly attests the accelerating spread of coronavirus. The last time we had more cases per day was on 11 June (199). There were 105 new cases reported on average in the last seven days, 29% more than a week earlier.

For now, the daily reports do not show a marked increase in coronavirus-related fatalities. The 7-day average is 1.4, up from 1.3 a week earlier.

There are 93 people with coronavirus infection in hospital, 9 of whom require mechanical ventilation. The former marks a 22% w/e growth, while the latter compares with 11 people on ventilators a week ago.

Here are two charts to compare the current numbers with those we saw in the same period of 2020.

The chart below shows the 7-day rolling averages of COVID-19 patients in hospitals as a percentage of active cases (distorted, given that the records of active cases does not keep track of the actual number of people with COVID-19, and there has recently been a drastic reclassification from active status to recovered), and those on ventilators as a percentage of those in hospitals, which has been hovering in range between 14% and 16% for a month. The index has now dropped to 13.3%.

Here are four more charts with the absolute number of COVID-19 patients in hospitals and on ventilators (top two) as well as two ratios (COVID-19 cases in hospital / Active cases, and COVID-19 cases on ventilator / Cases in hospital, bottom two.) The left-hand charts depict a longer period of two months, while the right-hand ones show changes over the past three weeks.

And here’s one that shows the 7-day average changes per day over the past three weeks, and it also attests the rising number of COVID-19 patients in hospitals and on ventilators.

Over the past 24 hours, Hungarian authorities tested 18,410 COVID-19 samples, and the doubling of the daily performance from Tuesday resulted in a drop of the positivity rate to 0.98% from 1.43%.

As regards the following chart, when the pink curve is under 100%, the pandemic is subsiding, when it is north of 100% it is picking up. Between 90% and 100% is is stagnating.

When the 3d/21d ratio changes, the trend in the daily figures will remain intact for weeks. This curve precedes every other change by three to four weeks, either when it rises or when it falls.

At this point, there's no way of telling how long the daily figures will keep on rising, but this particular ratio will go way up. Once the 7-day average peaks out and starts to drop we'll know that the daily figures will show increases for another three to four weeks. If no restriction measures are implemented to curb the spread of coronavirus, it will be more than four weeks and the rise in the 3d/21d ratio will not stop any time soon.

Practically, if authorities do no start to perform more tests, a lot more, then we can throw the statistics out the window. Without testing the official figures (new daily cases, people in hospital, Covid deaths) will mask reality, and the only way to find out how serious this wave of the pandemic is will be to wait for the Central Statistical Office's (KSH) to publish its mortality data months later.

The vaccination campaign remains extremely slow, with only 6,328 first and 694 second doses administered yesterday. 240,000 people have received a third dose of a COVID-19 vaccine as of Tuesday.