The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound impact on the world, leading to significant changes in healthcare systems and society. In the early stages of the pandemic, studies showed that people hospitalized with COVID-19 had a higher risk of mortality than those hospitalized with seasonal influenza.
However, since then, there have been changes in SARSCoV-2 itself, clinical care, and population-level immunity, and it is unclear whether COVID-19 still carries a higher risk of mortality than seasonal influenza.Â
To address this question, a study was conducted using the US Department of Veterans Affairs electronic health databases. Those who had at least one hospital admission record between February 2 and March 10, 2003, with a diagnosis of COVID-19 or seasonal influenza, were eligible to enroll. The cohort’s endpoint was either the first death or March 2, 2023.Â
The JAMA Network compared the mortality rate of COVID-19 hospitalizations to that of seasonal influenza hospitalizations using inverse probability-weighted Cox survival models. Logistic regression was used to generate a propensity score, and then inverse probability weighting was used to achieve group parity. The previous information was utilized to determine variables, which were established three years before enrolment.Â
This study conducted in the fall-winter of 2022-2023 found that being hospitalized with COVID-19 carried a higher risk of death than being hospitalized with seasonal influenza. The study included patients who had at least one hospital admission record between 2 and 10 days before a positive test result for SARS-CoV-2 or influenza and an admission diagnosis for COVID-19 or seasonal influenza.
According to the study, COVID-19 hospitalized two to three times as many persons as seasonal flu. Mortality rates from COVID-19 were 17% to 21% in 2020 compared to 6% in this study, and death rates from influenza were 3.8% in 2020 versus 3.7% in this study, indicating that the mortality rate differential between the two viruses has lessened since the pandemic began.Â
The study also found that the increased risk of death was greater among unvaccinated individuals than those vaccinated or boosted. These findings emphasize the importance of vaccination in reducing the risk of COVID-19 death. The study’s limitations include the fact that the population was predominantly male and older, which may limit the generalizability of the findings to broader populations.
The results may also not reflect the risk in non-hospitalized individuals. Furthermore, the analyses did not examine the causes of death, and residual confounding cannot be ruled out. Overall, the study provides important insights into the ongoing management of the COVID-19 pandemic and highlights the continued importance of vaccination in reducing the risk of severe illness and death.Â
