Do individuals who have received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine in the United Kingdom make up 60% of COVID-19 hospitalizations in that country? No, that's not true: the statistic was stated erroneously by Sir Patrick Vallance, government chief scientific adviser in the U.K. Vallance later corrected himself via Twitter, saying that at the time, 60% of COVID-19 hospitalizations were unvaccinated individuals.
The claim appeared in an Instagram post (archived here) published on July 19, 2021. It featured a screenshot of a tweet that read:
JUST IN - 60% of people being admitted to hospital with #COVID19 in England have had two doses of a coronavirus vaccine, according to the government's chief scientific advisor.
The caption of the post read:
This is playing out just as many predicted...
This is how the post looked on July 20, 2021:
(Source: Instagram screenshot taken on Tue Jul 20 17:45:31 2021 UTC)
Vallance stated the figure during a 10 Downing Street coronavirus press conference on July 19, 2021. It was in response to a public question about what percentage of individuals who make up the country's COVID-19 hospitalizations have been vaccinated. The following video of the press conference starts at the 25:43-mark, which is when the question was asked:
Vallance provided the statistic and his response at the 26:26-mark, also explaining that as more people receive two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, there will inevitably be more hospitalizations of doubly vaccinated individuals:
However, Vallance corrected himself later that day on Twitter, stating that the 60% statistic was wrong:
Correcting a statistic I gave at the press conference today, 19 July. About 60% of hospitalisations from covid are not from double vaccinated people, rather 60% of hospitalisations from covid are currently from unvaccinated people.
-- Sir Patrick Vallance (@uksciencechief) July 19, 2021
Lead Stories reached out to the U.K.'s Government Office For Science for further clarification of Vallance's statement about more vaccinated people making up a larger percentage COVID-19 hospitalizations in the future. A representative pointed us to a Twitter thread from Public Health England:
It's really important to get both doses of your #vaccine to get maximum protection against #COVID19, including the Delta variant.
-- Public Health England (@PHE_uk) July 1, 2021
Further information about the Delta variant and other variants of concern can be found here: https://t.co/NxiBAb3wk0
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