According to a report by ECO, of the 935 deaths from Covid-19 in January, 317 occurred in people with a booster dose, which corresponds to 32% of the total deaths recorded in that month, reveals the “red lines” report from the Instituto Nacional de Saúde Doutor Ricardo Jorge (INSA) and the Directorate-General for Health (DGS).

Another 259 deaths (26%) occurred in unvaccinated people, 27 (3%) in people with incomplete vaccination and 332 (33%) in people with a complete vaccination schedule.

In other words, “the risk of death for cases diagnosed in January, measured through lethality, by vaccination status, was two to six times lower in people with complete vaccination compared to people who were not vaccinated or with an incomplete schedule”, reads the risk analysis of the pandemic released this Friday.

Reducing risk

In the population aged 80 years and over, the booster dose reduced the risk of death from SARS-CoV-2 by almost four times compared to those who have fully vaccinated, and reduced the risk of death by eight times compared to those who were not vaccinated or with incomplete schema. These data are still provisional, as deaths in infected people can still be observed at the end of January.

As for hospitalisations, citizens with full vaccination had a risk of hospitalisation “two to seven times lower” than those who were not vaccinated, among the total number of people infected in December.

For the population over 80 years of age alone, the risk of hospitalisation for people with a complete vaccination schedule “was less than half” compared to those who were not vaccinated. "The risk of hospitalisation for those who have a booster dose is one third of the risk of hospitalisation for those who have a full vaccination", adds the document.