Hospitalization data shows that at one point during the latest surge, children made up 13% of all COVID-19 hospitalizations. The Delta variant led to the highest number of child hospitalizations than at any period in the pandemic for which data is available.
The data also shows that while hospitalization spikes occurred in every state, states in the South and Mountain West were especially affected. These states have vaccination rates lower than the nation overall. Due to the availability of vaccines, the latest increase in hospitalizations was lower than the spike last winter.
All hospitals registered as Medicare or Medicaid health providers must report hospital utilization data regularly to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). There are nearly 6,000 hospitals covered under the policy and they didn’t consistently report COVID-19 information until October 2020. As a result, complete hospitalization data from the first two COVID-19 surges is unavailable.
