Unvaccinated people 16 times more likely to need intensive care or die from COVID-19 Australias NSW

SYDNEY: Unvaccinated people are 16 times more likely to end up in intensive care units or die from COVID-19, Australia's New South Wales state said in a report, with officials urging people to get inoculated as Australia begins to live with the coronavirus.

The data from New South Wales (NSW) health department out late on Monday (Nov 8) showed only 11 per cent of people out of 412 who died from the Delta outbreak over four months up to early October were fully vaccinated. The average age of those deaths was 82.

Only around 3 per cent of people in intensive care units had two doses, while more than 63 per cent of the 61,800 cases detected between Jun 16 and Oct 7 were unvaccinated.

"Young people with two doses of a vaccine experienced lower rates of infection and almost no serious disease, while those unvaccinated in this age group were at greater risk of developing COVID-19 and needing hospitalisation," NSW Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant said in a statement.

The report's findings were in line with data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which said in September that unvaccinated individuals were 11 times more likely to die from COVID-19 than those who were fully vaccinated.

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