Despite many Americans being determined to “move on” from the pandemic and resume normal activities, COVID-19 continues to exact a toll, particularly among older adults, according to two new data analyses.
The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation released a report Friday showing that two doses of COVID-19 vaccines prevented at least 330,000 deaths and almost 700,000 hospitalizations among adult Medicare beneficiaries in 2021.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 93% of older adults received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine. Despite that high level of vaccine coverage, more than 300 people daily are dying from the virus — 70% of those deaths are among adults aged 75 or more years — with more than 3,300 hospitalized, according to CDC data.
“This is unacceptable, particularly because we can now prevent almost every COVID death in the country with vaccines and treatments that we have,” White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Ashish Jha, MD, MPH, said Friday in a press conference.
The issue, he said, is older adults who are not up to date on booster shots or not receiving COVID-19 treatments, such as Paxlovid, when they have a breakthrough infection.
“If you are up to date on your vaccines and you get treated when you have a breakthrough infection, your chances of dying are close to zero, even in that high-risk population,” Jha said.
Similarly, a Kaiser Family Foundation study found that despite widespread vaccine coverage in older adults, death rates from COVID-19 this past summer among those aged 65 or more years rose faster than in any other age group.
According to the KFF study, the number of COVID-19-related deaths among older adults more than doubled between April and July, topping more than 11,000 deaths in July and August. COVID-19-related deaths among those aged 65 or more years grew from 24% in January to 40% in September.
Comparatively, deaths among adults under 65 also increased 52% during that time, with 1,900 deaths in July and August.
“People 65 and older have consistently accounted for a larger share of COVID-19 deaths than those younger than 65 and represented 88% of all deaths in September 2022 — the highest share since the pandemic began more than two years ago,” KFF researchers wrote.
As with the ASPE study, KFF researchers found that although older adults had a high vaccination rate — 92.4% for the primary vaccination series — enthusiasm for subsequent boosters waned: 71.1% received the first booster, but only 43.8% received the second booster dose, according to the CDC.
KFF researchers attributed the rise in deaths to increasing cases of the more transmissible omicron variant, along with relatively low booster uptake and waning vaccine immunity, “underscoring the importance of staying up to date on vaccination.”
The HHS study analyzed Medicare claims and county-level vaccination data to estimate reductions in COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths associated with vaccination in 2021. The KFF analysis used CDC data.
