Covid in Norway--Numbers from Week 6: 42% of hospitalisations occur among triple-jabbed, in the past 4 weeks, 'injected' die at 3X the rate of 'unvaccinated'

It gets worse every week: most injected are 50+, virtually all triple-jabbed are in high-risk groups, the IPH doesn't want you to read crucial studies (and 'bends' reality)

As we await Health Minister Mückstein’s reply to the Constitutional Court’s laundry list of probing questions—submitted in late January, the answer is due, well, today—let’s have another look at the official Norwegian data.

If you’re new to my substack, these data come directly from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health (IPH), which is the national public health authority ‘in charge of’ whatever the government and the Health Directorate deem necessary to fight Sars-Cov-2. They have a Norwegian and an English website, dedicated sections on the expectable issues mainly around ‘Korona’, as it’s called here, and the issue weekly reports as well as risk assessments that I go through on a week-by-week as well as event-based occasion.

Here follows a brief note of welcome (due to a large influx of new subscribers), if you’re already quite familiar with my Covid from Norway updates, you may skip to the main course.

Sidenote (to my new readers): my most recent pieces, in which I look at both weekly numbers (from late Jan. through the first third of Feb.) and the most current risk assessment came in two parts, can be found here (pt. 1), in which I discuss the following: 2022 saw much higher rates of hospitalisation, ICU admission, and deaths, with esp. the latter accruing to 93% (!) in the elderly (60+); and here (pt. 2), where it is clearly shown that ‘all-cause jabbed’ are leading hospitalisations, ICU admissions, deaths, esp. pronounced among ‘boosted’ individuals.

There’s one other thing to mention: why should you care about Norway and its numbers?

Well, since the failures of the current injections becoming too numerous and too widely-known to hide in gargantuan heaps of official, if often disorganised, data (see, e.g., for Alex Berenson here on Scotland and here for Igor Chugov on its likely camp-follower, the UKHSA), Scandinavian governments have been slightly less obfuscating and more forthright about the progression on all matters Covid-19.

That said, you may wish to check out my accounts from mid-January (here and here), which shows that rates of hospitalisation, ICU admission, and deaths among ‘all-cause vaccinated’ are at least (!) ten (!) times higher than for the ‘unvaccinated’ since the injections were rolled out on 28. Dec. 2020.

Without much further ado, let’s see what the IPH has provided us with in week 6.

Numbers from Norway, Week 6

Sidenote: there’s always both a Norwegian and English version of these ‘weekly updates’, which always incl. a linked PDF to the most current week. Keep in mind that the IPH’s Norwegian website is both more up-to-date and more comprehensive than the English version, which is why I always use the original-language documents provided (also, the English links are so useless, for if you use a Norwegian page and click on the ‘read in English’ button in the top-right corner, it’ll always take you back to the front page…).

Here’s the direct link to the update for week 6 (6-13 Feb. 2022).

Last time I wrote about the state of Covid-19 in Norway, I mentioned that ‘hospitalisations have increased and appear to be on a plateau right now’ (referring to weeks 4 and 5), with the below figure from Fig. 3 (p. 10, week 5):

Well, how did my above estimate age? Given the shape of Fig. 4 in this week’s report (p. 10), I daresay that I was spot-on.

Also, there’s plenty of legacy media coverage reporting on ‘the highest-ever number of Covid-related hospitalisations’, with the expectation among the healthcare chieftains that these numbers ‘will double’, as per Bergens Tidende (paywalled), ‘but there are many reasons not to freak out’.

As regards the usual suspects in terms of metrics, here’s data on hospitalisations, ICU admissions, and deaths according to injection states (pp. 12-14, with the below graph on p. 14):

Hospitalisations: in week 6, 296 new admissions were recorded, of which injection status is known in 253 cases. Of these, 83 (33%) were ‘unvaccinated’, 54 (21%) had achieved ‘basic immunisation’ (grunnvaksinert) with two injections, and 104 (42%) had also received a booster. Furthermore, 10 (4%) were ‘partially vaccinated’ (i.e., received 1 jab).

Sidenote: while these numbers don’t add up (again, sigh), they are at least indicative of the inexorable trend towards what I call ‘alignment’, by which is meant that, eventually, the share of ‘unvaccinated’ and ‘all-cause injected’ (1, 2, or 3 doses) should be roughly in the same ballpark as their shares among the overall population. According to OWID, c. 73% of the entire Norwegian resident population have received at least two injections, with another 5.7% who received one injection, bringing the total up to 79%.

Still, taken together, they paint a quite clear picture: the relationship between ‘unvaccinated’ : ‘all-cause injected’ stands now at 33 : 67. For indications about the trend, we turn to the shares of the past five weeks (numbers below indicate not all new admissions, but only those whose injection status was known; at some point, I’ll do a ‘clean-up’ here, too, but for now let’s ‘play along’ and look at ‘vaccine efficacy’):

• Week 1: 138 new admissions, of whom 64 were ‘unvaccinated’, a share of 49%.

• Week 2: 112, of whom 47 were ‘unvaccinated’, a share of 47%.

• Week 3: 130, of whom 38 were ‘unvaccinated’, a share of 29%.

• Week 4: 181, of whom 56 were ‘unvaccinated’, a share of 31%.

• Week 5: 194, of whom 59 were ‘unvaccinated’, a share of 30%.

• Week 6: 296, of whom 83 were ‘unvaccinated’, a share of 33%.

So, we are able to observe both a quite drastic reduction of ‘unvaccinated’ admissions as a percentage of the total at the same time hospitalisations rose by 214% since the beginning of January 2022.

If we look closer, though, the most drastic aspect is—the increase in both absolute numbers and the share of the total of ‘boosted’ admissions during the same period:

• Week 1: 138 admissions, of whom 24 were ‘boosted’, a share of 18%

• Week 6: 296, of whom 106 were ‘boosted’, a share of 42%.

In other words: admissions of individuals with a booster injection rose by 442% in the past five (!) weeks alone.

Expressed in visual form, the IPH provides us with Fig. 7 (p. 14):

So far, so understandable—and we haven’t reached the peak of the Omicron wave (yet), hence these shares will continue to vary. Still, I think last Friday’s tentative conclusions have held up quite well:

I expect the ‘fully vaccinated’ (two doses) group among hospitalisations etc. to plummet further—most will go for the third injection, thus further driving the dynamic, which will inexorably result in much higher rates of hospitalisations, ICU admissions, and death among the ‘fully vaccinated and boosted’ group.

This is precisely what we are seeing: booster injections will soon ‘dominate’ these numbers even more clearly than they do already, mainly driven by more (and younger than 45) Norwegians continuing to line up for a third injection. This tendency will in likelihood cause three main consequences:

• In the very short term, the share of ‘fully vaccinated’ (2 doses) will decline precipitously as the share of boosted (3 doses) consequently rises further.

• In the short-to-medium term, recently-boosted (after the conventional 14-day window of not considering them ‘boosted’) individuals will ‘enjoy’ some 8-10 weeks of (some) ‘protection’ against all the bad things associated with Covid-19.

• In the medium-to-long term, however, as injection-induced ‘protection’ among the ‘boosted’ wanes again, I expect the share of hospitalisations, ICU admissions, and deaths among the ‘boosted’ to go higher and higher still.

At that point, however, we’ll be very much past the presumed seasonal peak of Omicron infections, hence it’s fair to assume, however tentatively, that once the current seasonal wave has passed, we’ll see an unusual second wave of cases, hospitalisations, and deaths in late spring.

Lest I forget, here are the numbers from week 6, as represented in Table 6 (p. 13), with some of the (highlighted) data of the past 4 weeks (siste 4 uker) discussed below:

Sheer numbers (antall, the first yellow arrow): 254 ‘unvaccinated’ admissions vs. (210 + 313) = 525 for the ‘all-cause injected’, or more than twice (106%) the number of the ‘unvaccinated’. There also roughly twice the number of ‘all-cause injected’ among ICU admissions (26 vs. 14) and among those requiring mechanical ventilation (23 vs. 12).

Median age (median, the yellow arrow closer to the right end): among the ‘normal’ hospital admissions, the median age was 33 years (‘unvaccinated’) vs. 49 (2 doses) vs. 72 (3 doses); among ICU admissions, the differences aren’t as stark, but they are still noticeable (46 vs. 63 vs. 70); among those requiring mechanical ventilation, we see a comparable pattern (56 vs. 63 vs. 68).

It is fair to assume that the ‘normal’ hospitalisations among the ‘unvaccinated’ will be more like, well, maybe a one-night stay is required, and upon release there’s some prescription drugs to pick up (they are in the early 30s), which is very different from the ‘boosted’ admissions who were in their 70s. The same age ‘benefit’ may also be assumed to play out, albeit to lesser degrees, among the ICU admissions and those on a ventilator.

Have one last look at the share of high-risk groups among those hospitalised, admitted to the ICU, or requiring mechanical ventilation, though (this is the right-most column):

The share of medium-to-high risk patients among the ‘unvaccinated’ is about a quarter (‘normal’ hospitalisation) and never exceeds 50%.

By contrast—which seems an oddly weak word here—the share of medium-to-high risk patients among the ‘fully vaccinated’ (2 doses) starts out at 52% (‘normal’ hospitalisation) and rises to 69% (ICU admissions and/or ventilator).

The rates are much, much worse for those with three doses: the share of medium-to-high risk patients among the ‘boosted’ starts out at 81% in the ‘normal’ hospitalisation category, but ‘due to privacy rights’ (this is the ** note at the bottom), there’s no data provided on their share among ICU admissions and/or those requiring mechanical ventilation. I think it’s fair to assume that virtually all ‘boosted’ patients who are admitted to the ICU and/or require mechanical ventilation.

What does this mean? For guidance, we turn to…

Crucial Context via the IPH’s Risk Assessment

Well, for guidance we turn, again, to the IPH’s most recent risk assessment (dated 9 Feb. 2022, my take on this is here), which holds (at p. 22, my emphases):

Greater immune evasion. Omicron infects people with some existing immunity to a greater extent than Delta. They are not well protected against becoming infected, but well protected against serious illness.

One minor note: there’s a footnote in the original, which links to Battacharyya et al. 2022.

Translated into plain English, there are two main points:

1. The existing injections play a limited role in the current Omicron wave.

2. Those who received (any number of) these injections are—allegedly—‘well protected against serious illness’.

So, let’s see what Battacharyya et al. have to say about these two points, shall we (my emphases, followed by a brief comment below each quote):

People with preexisting immunity are expected to have less severe outcomes from subsequent infection.

Plain English: we don’t really know, but let’s just state so (although it’s a reasonable assumption).

Omicron’s estimated relative severity [compared to Delta] is greater in analyses that account for vaccination status and documented previous infection. This finding is in keeping with the likelihood that a portion of the observed reduction in severity stems from Omicron’s greater ability to infect people with preexisting immunity, which protects somewhat against severe disease.

Plain English: the above expectation is based on Omicron’s preference for (re-) infecting those ‘with preexisting immunity’, whether deriving from prior infection or injection. So, we’d need to really know the share of Norwegians who were infected to kinda put these above weekly update into context.

Fortunately, the IPH’s recent risk assessment shows these data in Fig. 1 (p. 9):

Do you see these numbers in the three right-most columns (highlighted)? It tells you that the 60+ yo segments of the population has been very effectively shielded so far, even though seniors make up a massively disproportionate share among cases, hospitalisations, ICU admissions, and deaths:

• 93% of all Covid-associated deaths occurred among 60+ residents.

• 53% of all Covid-associated ICU admissions occurred among 60+ residents.

• And 42% of all Covid-associated hospitalisations among 60+ residents.

By contrast, 60+ residents constitute only a mere 3% of all cases (påvist smittet, bottom line).

Two more brief snippets here: the IPH linked to Battacharyya et al. 2022 to support its assertion of ‘good injection-afforded protection’, yet Battacharyya et al. conclude as follows (my emphasis):

Our collective intuition regarding how a population-level CFR or IFR relates to a variant’s intrinsic severity needs to be recalibrated over time as immunity accrues—especially with a variant with the immune-evasion capabilities of omicron.

Last Words: Covid-associated Deaths in Week 6

The final two paragraphs belong, again, to Covid-associated deaths, as recorded in the weekly update on pp. 19-20.

Here, the major milestone, as per p. 19 (my emphasis):

Since the beginning of the injection program [28 Dec. 2020] up to, and including, week 6, the injection status of 1,112 Covid-associated deaths is known. Of these, 549 (49.4%) were ‘unvaccinated’, 525 (47.2%) were ‘fully vaccinated’ (of whom 114 received 3 doses), and 3.4% were ‘partially vaccinated’.

This means—there are now officially more Covid-associated deaths in Norway among the ‘all-cause injected’ than among those who elected to forego these injections.

What’s even worse for the injected, though, is that the ‘all-cause injected’ are dying at more than 3X (!) the rate than the ‘unvaccinated’ in the past four weeks, as shown in Table 9 (p. 20):

Afterthoughts

And, finally, in light of the above numbers from the past six weeks, the only relevant question to be asked by, well, I daresay everybody in Norway is:

How on God’s green earth are the government and the IPH able to tell the people that these injections do anything, least of all for those who are at most risk from Covid-19 (the elderly and those with comorbidities)?

I can only explain this by resorting to my own experiences in academia (albeit in a different field): those who proclaim such blanket statements—which are, quite often, as unsupported by the cited references as in the above case—either don’t want (you) to check the footnotes or pursue ulterior motives. Yes, there are quite a number of useful idiots as well, but laziness and ignorance will not shield them from suffering the eventual consequences.