Only 51 Australians on ventilators with Covid, the majority unvaccinated or suffering the Delta variant

The Prime Minister also revealed the majority of patients in ICU across the nation were either unvaccinated or suffering the Delta variant.

Nationwide, the number of people on ventilators has fallen from 54 on December 15 to 51 now — despite the mammoth surge in cases since then — with the Australia and New Zealand Intensive Care Society saying the nation was well prepared to deal with an ICU surge.

This comes amid questions about how hospitalisation statistics are reported, after it was revealed yesterday “up to half” of NSW’s “hospitalised Covid cases” were not admitted because of the virus at all.

It has since emerged there are similar reporting systems in Queensland and Victoria.

Victoria revealed a significant number of people recorded as Covid-19 cases in hospital had initially been admitted for reasons ranging from cancer treatment to broken bones.

The Prime Minister has vowed to press premiers for a uniform definition of Covid hospitalisations at the next national cabinet meeting on Wednesday.

“I make the point on hospitalisation, and this is one of the things we’re going to have to discuss this week, I’m heading down to Canberra today, with the premiers is this definition of hospitalisation,” he told the Today Show.

“There are people being counted as being in hospital for Covid. They didn‘t go there for Covid. They went there for some other reason and that’s why they were admitted, and they’ve been tested when they’re there and they’ve been found to have Covid.

“So, we need to get a standard definition on that because these are the key things we have to track now.”

Victorian Health Minister Martin Foley said people who go to hospital for reasons other than Covid-19, and then test positive, had to be counted in the hospitalisations tally due to the different care they needed.

“We are seeing people who are now tested automatically ­before they go into hospital, ticking positive if they’re showing up for their cancer treatment, if they’re showing up for their broken bones,” he said.

“As a result, we have to then treat those people the same way, the same Covid positive and safe way, that we treat everyone else who’s got Covid.”

News.com.au has reached out to other state health departments to see whether they classify Covid hospitalisations in the same way.

Only 172 people were in ICU across Australia with Covid-19 as of Monday, but hospitals are bracing for a surge in admissions.

It is anticipated that NSW could set a new record for hospitalisations in the coming days, as numbers near the figure reached during the height of the Delta outbreak in September.

There were 1204 people in the state’s hospitals with the virus on Monday, just 62 cases shy of the record set on September 21 when NSW was in the grips of Delta.

Monday’s figure marked a rise by 165 on the previous day’s figure.

Amid escalating case numbers, Premier Dominic Perrottet has been urging residents to turn their attention from the caseload to hospital numbers.

Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant on Monday said authorities would be looking at “the whole picture”, including hospitalisation figures, intensive care admissions, the positivity rate and case numbers.

As of Monday morning there were 1204 people with Covid in hospital in NSW, with 95 in ICU.

Health Minister Brad Hazzard admitted over two days during the week, up to half of those cases were in hospital for something else entirely — raising questions about how hospitalisation figures are reported.

“A reasonable proportion of cases being classified as Covid hospitalisations are actually people with other reasons for admission,” NSW health minister Brad Hazzard said.

“Heart attacks, births, falls, none of that stops just because there is Covid. They come into hospital, they have a swab taken and it confirms Covid.

“This shows us its out in the community, but we aren’t necessarily seeing that as the primary reason for all of the admissions.”

While Mr Hazzard admitted hospitals are under increasing strain, preliminary analysis shows that Omicron so far has proved to cause a much milder illness for many people compared with previous strains.

Queensland Health said a person is usually admitted to hospital after they have tested positive for Covid in Queensland.

“At the moment, we are only admitting patients that require clinical intervention, if the patient is generally well, they will be treated at home in a virtual ward,” a spokeswoman said.

“Of course, with current community transmission, there may be people that present to hospital with another aliment that end up also positive for Covid.

“They however, would not be recorded in our reporting of a Covid hospitalisation until they have tested positive for Covid.”

The Victorian Department of Health has not responded to requests for comment.

Meanwhile, Covid hospitalisations in NSW have doubled in the week since Christmas and are expected to rise even further as a rampant Omicron outbreak tests assurances the state’s health system can manage the surging load.

Monday’s 1204 hospitalisations are up from 388 hospitalisations reported on Christmas Day and 458 on Boxing Day, while the number of people in intensive care has risen by 30 – from 52 to 82 – in that time.

Political opponents have savaged the NSW government in recent days for its handling of the Omicron surge, particularly how it is resourcing an increasingly under-pressure health system.

Premier Dominic Perrottet and Health Minister Brad Hazzard have consistently stated that the state’s health system is in a solid position despite the dramatic rise in infections and mayhem caused by an explosion in testing demands.

However, a decision to pare back isolation requirements for hospital staff has been described as a sign the system is coming under intense pressure.

NSW Health revealed on Friday that health workers classified as close contacts will be permitted to leave self-isolation in exceptional circumstances to ensure hospitals and testing clinics are not disrupted.

Staff shortages have become a big issue in parts of the state’s system, with a leaked email claiming one Sydney hospital is “extremely vulnerable”.

Australian Medical Association vice-president Chris Moy said he was getting calls from doctors and administrators who were “extremely worried” about rising Covid cases despite fewer people being hospitalised.

He said staff were being furloughed because they are getting sick or are being deemed close contacts.

“What’s happening there is that the staffing situation is becoming pretty critical at the moment,” Dr Moy told ABC on Sunday morning.

This was “right across the board” but NSW was probably worse than other parts of the country, he said.

“I’m hearing about teams getting completely wiped out essentially because they are either contacts or they are positive,” he said.

“This is leading to a real problem and a real squeeze at the moment which is causing extreme stress on very exhausted health workforce,” the doctor explained. His comments come after the ABC reported a leaked email showed soaring Covid-19 hospitalisations left one of Sydney’s largest hospitals “extremely vulnerable”.

– with NCA NewsWire

Originally published as Only 51 Australians on ventilators with Covid, the majority unvaccinated or suffering the Delta variant