According to health officials and government data, a significant proportion of people hospitalized with COVID-19 were admitted for other reasons.
The scale of the phenomenon in the US is not recorded in federal statistics.
In a Wednesday night interview with MSNBC, Anthony Fauci, the chief medical adviser to the White House, described the phenomenon in children.
Fauci said that many hospital admissions are tested for COVID, as opposed to because of COVID. He said that the real reason for hospitalization might be a broken leg.
A reporter for the Washington Post said that a similar thing can happen with adults. According to an unnamed DC area health official, people with mild COVID who test positive are still counted in the headline hospitalization statistics.
Other countries have produced similar data. The data published Friday by the UK National Health Service shows that 32% of the 8,321 COVID positive cases in England on December 28 were admitted to the hospital for a different reason.
Chris Hopson, the head of the umbrella group for the health system, said in a series of posts that the level of COVID admissions was a key factor in how senior managers planned their hospital capacity.
Chris Hopson is the CEO of the company.
A report from the Medical Research Council of South Africa found a high rate of incidental cases, the first nation to record a surge in Omicron cases.
In a study of 166 patients who were admitted to a hospital in Tshwane between November 14 and November 29 of this year, 75% had at least one case of chronic bronchitis.
It does not mean that there is nothing to worry about when patients have COVID.
David Strain, a senior clinical lecturer at the England's University of Exeter medical school, told The Guardian that it's still concerning if you get admitted.
He told the outlet that they've seen many other people who were otherwise stable who had chronic diseases such as heart failure and had a rapid deterioration.
Patients who have other medical problems and also have COVID can still be seriously harmed.
