Corona update: more new cases and hospital admissions, but also good news
The corona pandemic is not over yet, as the stronger delta variant is dominating in Belgium: 38 hospitalisations per day, and over 1,500 new cases. The good news is that the number of patients in intensive care remains more or less stable.
The past week saw 38 hospital admissions per day, which is 34 percent up on the week. The number of newly reported cases is also up again, climbing to 1,557 per day. This is 5 percent up on the week.
It shows that, despite the vaccination campaign keeping its momentum, the pandemic is not over yet. The contagious delta variant accounts for over 90 percent of the new cases in Belgium now.
Still, the number of Covid patients in Belgian hospitals who are in a bad way remains relatively stable. The total number of corona patients went up to reach 368 (+26) but the number of corona patients in intensive care remains below 100 at present: 97 to be precise (+3). 46 of them (-1) are on ventilators. The latter is 16 percent down on the week, the former remains stable on the week.
The status-quo comes despite the fact that the number of new cases and hospitalisations had gone up some time before. Belgium has three Covid fatalities per day on average nowadays.
The vaccination campaign is cruising. About 83 percent of the adult population in Belgium has received at least one jab. Over 73 percent of them has been double-jabbed. However, looking at the whole population, this figure drops to 59 percent. Today, it also emerged that the vaccination rate among the Brussels population may be underestimated, because there are many people with a double nationality there who may have got a vaccine elsewhere. Brussels has a significantly lower vaccination rate than Flanders and Wallonia.