The Oregon Health Authority launched a new panel this week shedding more light on the pre-existing health conditions and disease progress of nearly 2,000 Oregon residents who have died of COVID-19 since the outbreak began last year.
According to the newly released data, 85% of Oregon residents who died from the disease had at least one underlying condition. Only 2% were found to have no underlying diseases, while the status of 12% of those who died is unknown.
Half of the people who died of the coronavirus in Oregon had cardiovascular disease, according to the data, making it the most common underlying disease. Here is the frequency of illness among those who died, according to the health authority:
- 50% cardiovascular disease
- 34% neurological condition
- 29% diabetes
- 28% other chronic diseases
- 22% chronic lung disease
- 20% kidney disease
- 14% ex-smoker
- 13% obesity
- 8% immunocompromised condition
- 4% liver disease
- 3% current smoker
There is no discrimination in how these conditions are distributed among age groups. More than half of the people who died in Oregon – 1,005 in 1,924 – were 80 or older.
The new table also includes more information about the symptoms of people who died of the disease, although for the most part the data is obscure, with most of the symptoms of people listed as “unknown”.
It also includes a graph that shows how many people who died were in a “living together” situation, which includes long-term institutions, prisons and shelters.
The new panel comes after OHA’s announcement on Wednesday that it would no longer be releasing demographic information about each individual death.
OHA launched the new panel about five months after The Oregonian asked state officials to provide similar information about the underlying health conditions.
At the time, spokeswoman Delia Hernández said that the state “is not publishing this data because the information routinely available on the COVID-19 cases lacks sufficient details to provide useful information on the specific conditions that make up the comprehensive categories included in the table. underlying conditions ”.
The last time the state released this type of data was in May. At that time, only 109 people in Oregon died of COVID-19. That report said that 61.4% of those who died from the disease also suffered from cardiovascular disease and 46.5% had neurological / neurological development conditions.
– Lizzy Acker
503-221-8052, [email protected], @lizzzyacker