Labor Day COVID Hospitalizations Four Times Worse in 2021 Than 2020

Colorado officials had hoped that by this point in 2021, the fight against COVID-19 would be almost over. But just-released data from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment paints a very different picture, especially when you compare this Labor Day weekend with last year's.

Over four times as many people were hospitalized for the disease on September 5, the most recent date available, than on the same date in 2020. (Last year, Labor Day was on September 7; this year, it was September 6.)

Here are the latest statistics in major categories from the CDPHE, updated after 4 p.m. September 6. They're juxtaposed with information from our most recent COVID-19 roundup, which tracked figures from August 30.

627,415 cases (up 13,685 from August 30)
24,237 variants of concern (up 1,925 from August 30)
2,617 variants under investigation (up 1 from August 30)
36,315 hospitalized (up 712 from August 30)
64 counties (unchanged since August 30)
7,225 deaths among cases (up 96 from August 30)
7,489 deaths due to COVID-19 (up 67 from August 30)
5,833 outbreaks (up 76 from August 30)

Four major takeaways:

• New cases took another major leap: 13,685 for the week ending September 6, compared to 10,464 over the seven days ending August 30.

• Hospitalizations jumped, too, with new admissions going from 507 for August 24-30 to 712 for August 31-September 6.

• Deaths from COVID-19 declined, but not by much. The health department counted 67 deaths from the virus from August 31 through September 6, compared to 75 for the previous week.

• New outbreaks continue to surface in the wake of schools reopening for the academic year: 56 on August 30, 76 on September 6.

At least the state positivity rate dipped a bit, from 8.68 percent on August 30 to 6.26 percent on September 6. But that figure is still well over the 5 percent mark the CDPHE prefers not to exceed. And outpatient syndromic COVID-19 visits continue to rise. On August 30, they stood at 4.14 percent; on September 6, they were calculated at 5.58 percent. That stat had been in the 1-2 percent range a month or two ago.

Meanwhile, new daily cases hit quadruple digits on nine of the ten days between August 27 and September 5. Although the 1,148 new cases registered on September 5 was nowhere near the 2,077 tallied on September 1, it was more than four times higher than the number of new cases on September 5, 2020, when 280 were identified. Here's the latest rundown.

September 5 — 1,148 Cases
September 4 — 1,197 Cases
September 3 — 1,641 Cases
September 2 — 1,907 Cases
September 1 — 2,077 Cases
August 31 — 1,979 Cases
August 30 — 2,052 Cases
August 29 — 1,396 Cases
August 28 — 986 Cases
August 27 — 1,670 Cases

The 158 new hospital admissions for COVID on August 30 was the highest number since 164 on January 11 — and the comparison with last year is even more striking. On September 5, 2020, 29 new patients were admitted — two more than on September 5, 2021. But the seven-day average of admissions was just 19 on September 5, 2020, and it hit 100 on September 5, 2021.

Moreover, the 905 people hospitalized for the disease on September 5, 2021 (the most since 930 on January 12), is more than four times the 220 patients on September 5, 2020. Here's the latest:

New Hospital Admissions by Admission Date

September 5, 2021
27 new patients admitted to the hospital
100 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

September 4, 2021
62 new patients admitted to the hospital
102 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

September 3, 2021
90 new patients admitted to the hospital
107 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

September 2, 2021
146 new patients admitted to the hospital
109 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

September 1, 2021
79 new patients admitted to the hospital
105 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

August 31, 2021
139 new patients admitted to the hospital
106 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

August 30, 2021
158 new patients admitted to the hospital
105 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

August 29, 2021
37 new patients admitted to the hospital
95 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

August 28, 2021
101 new patients admitted to the hospital
93 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

August 27, 2021
104 new patients admitted to the hospital
89 seven-day average of new patients admitted to the hospital

Patients Currently Hospitalized for COVID-19

September 5, 2021
905 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
840 (93 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
65 (7 percent) Persons Under Investigation

September 4, 2021
903 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
833 (92 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
70 (8 percent) Persons Under Investigation

September 3, 2021
892 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
833 (93 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
59 (7 percent) Persons Under Investigation

September 2, 2021
893 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
816 (91 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
77 (9 percent) Persons Under Investigation

September 1, 2021
857 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
796 (93 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
61 (7 percent) Persons Under Investigation

August 31, 2021
902 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
808 (90 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
94 (10 percent) Persons Under Investigation

August 30, 2021
874 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
796 (91 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
78 (9 percent) Persons Under Investigation

August 29, 2021
845 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
756 (89 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
89 (11 percent) Persons Under Investigation

August 28, 2021
839 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
756 (90 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
83 (10 percent) Persons Under Investigation

August 27, 2021
793 Total COVID Patients (Confirmed & Suspected/PUI)
705 (89 percent) Confirmed COVID-19
88 (11 percent) Persons Under Investigation

The CDPHE's vaccine data dashboard doesn't show many statistical improvements, either. Among the categories showing declines in pace are the number of Coloradans who are fully immunized (from a 37,908 increase on August 30 to 36,020 on September 6), people immunized with at least one dose (from 36,915 to 34,285), people immunized with the Pfizer vaccine (from 5,697 to 1,453) and people immunized with the Moderna version (from 539 to 471). But at least four more people were inoculated with the Janssen vaccine on September 6 than on August 30. The details:

3,354,985 people fully immunized in Colorado (up 36,020 from August 30)
3,677,633 people immunized with at least one dose (up 34,285 from August 30)
1,453 people vaccinated on September 6 with Pfizer vaccine (down 4,244 from August 30); 3,516 immunizations with Pfizer vaccine reported September 6 but administered on an earlier date (down 661 from August 30)
471 people immunized on September 6 with Moderna vaccine (down 68 from August 30); 1,081 immunizations with Moderna vaccine reported September 6 but administered on an earlier date (down 143 from August 30)
37 people vaccinated on September 6 with Janssen (J&J) vaccine (up 4 from August 30); 83 immunizations with Janssen vaccine reported September 6 but administered on an earlier date (down 18 from August 30)

Last week, Governor Jared Polis issued safety warnings about Labor Day celebrations that sounded much like his advice the year before. Given the current numbers, they could have been worse.