COVID-19 levels are still lower than it’s been in a long time. Flu levels, on the other hand, are still going up. Charts From the BC CDC Situation Report: Comparison vs. Other Influenza-Like-Illnesses, from the Viral Pathogen Characterization page: Holy cow, was I wrong about influenza being over*! It is WAY higher than it was… Continue reading 2025-01-07 BC
Category: Statistics
2025-01-31 BC
There is a lot of respiratory illness going around, but right now, it looks like only about 6% of it is COVID-19! The last time there were so few people in hospital with COVID-19 was August 2023, and there haven’t been as few weekly confirmed cases since before testing was severely curtailed during the big… Continue reading 2025-01-31 BC
2025-01-25 BC
Everything COVID looks low-ish. Not gone, not low on an absolute scale, but definitely low on a relative scale. For example, while the lowest number in hospital with COVID-19 that we’ve seen since Omicron hit was ~65 (in the summer of 2023), right now we’re at about 80. Is this something special to BC, or… Continue reading 2025-01-25 BC
2025-01-18 BC
Yay! Something at the very end of this article (2025-01-17) on what the BC teen with bird flu went through says that she’s out of the hospital and back home. 🎉 Health Care System This report (2025-01-16) reports that an estimated 28,077 Canadians died while waiting for surgery or diagnostic tests between April 1, 2023… Continue reading 2025-01-18 BC
2025-01-10 BC
The province only gave numbers for flu A, flu B, RSV, and COVID-19 for the week ending 4 Jan 2025, but that’s enough to see that flu finally beat out RSV for the most prevalent respiratory disease. COVID-19 levels look still relatively low-ish, though the wastewater graph looks like they are going up slightly. Mitigation… Continue reading 2025-01-10 BC
2025-01-03 BC
RSV is significantly up, and is now slightly above last season’s peak. Flu is up significantly; COVID-19 is still low-ish but it has risen slightly. COVID-19 is only about a quarter of respiratory illnesses right now. Wastewater looks about as stable as it gets. For information about the Fraser teen who was hospitalized for bird… Continue reading 2025-01-03 BC
2024-11-16 BC
All indicators say that the levels of COVID-19 are coming down noticeably at the moment. Regarding influenza vaccines, flu rates have ticked up slightly but are still really low. It feels to me like we are about two weeks behind last year’s flu season, so I think that means flu will probably peak in late… Continue reading 2024-11-16 BC
2024-09-26 BC
Statistics Provincial weekly data releases have resumed effective today. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the statistics are different and not as transparent: the raw numbers are no longer published, just graphs (usually per million people). (This provincial report says the BC population is ~5.6M, by the way.) They have also removed… Continue reading 2024-09-26 BC
2024-09-07 BC
Cases are rising in the short term but kind of flat over a longer period. Positivity is creeping upwards, and the number in hospital is rising slowly. Wastewater is going up slowly in Fraser Health, flattish everywhere else. Anecdotally, lots of people “have a cold” right now. (It’s not “a cold”, it’s COVID-19, as I… Continue reading 2024-09-07 BC
2024-08-03 BC
It looks like levels are flat or maybe going down a little bit, which I find surprising because the USA is going bonkers with COVID-19 right now. Hospitals This article (2024-08-02) reports that BC hospitals’ Emergency Departments — including some in Metro Van — have continued to have trouble staying open due to physician shortages.… Continue reading 2024-08-03 BC