Hospitalizations of Covid-19 patients in their 30s have hit a new record, U.S. government data show, a sign of the toll that the highly contagious Delta variant is taking among the unvaccinated.
Thirty-somethings, who are in prime ages for work and parenting, had largely avoided hospital stays for Covid-19 during earlier phases of the pandemic because of their relative good health.
Yet the age group is seeing new Covid-19 hospital admissions increase during the recent Delta-driven surge, which doctors and epidemiologists attribute to the failure of large numbers of Americans to get vaccinated and their highly active lives.
The rate at which adults ages 30 to 39 are entering hospitals with Covid-19 reached about 2.5 per 100,000 people as of last Wednesday, according to the latest data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Department of Health and Human Services, up from the previous peak of roughly 2 per 100,000 people in early January.
“It means Delta is really bad,” said James Lawler, an infectious-disease physician and co-director of the Global Center for Health Security at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.