The challenges of Covid are well known: a respiratory condition which particularly affects the older and more vulnerable, with a high mortality rate amongst that group and with a ‘long tail’, where recovery can be protracted. 8,000 people with a Covid diagnosis in North
West England died between the start of the outbreak in February 2020 and November 2020.
The challenges of pneumonia, which are long-standing and complex, are perhaps less well known. The UK has the third highest age-adjusted death rate for pneumonia in Europe, behind only Romania and Slovakia. There were 272,000 pneumonia hospitalisations in
England in 2019, 42,000 of which were in the North West, a rate of 58 per 10,000 population. 6,700 (16%) died in hospital or within 30 days of discharge.
Read the full case study here