Among the unvaccinated, Delta variant more than doubles risk of hospitalization

New research from England’s public health service has confirmed a suspicion spawned by bursting hospital wards across the United States: The Delta variant of the coronavirus not only spreads 50% more readily than the Alpha variant it rapidly overtook, it’s also making unvaccinated people sicker.

Through most of April and May, unvaccinated Britons who were infected by the Delta variant were more than twice as likely to be admitted to hospitals than were their unvaccinated peers who were infected with the Alpha strain, which was first identified in the United Kingdom.

In addition, unvaccinated people infected with Delta were more likely than those infected with Alpha to seek care in a hospital’s emergency department, the new study found.

The report, published late Friday in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases, is considered the largest and most detailed accounting to date of the Delta variant’s impact on the pandemic. It is based on the health records of 43,338 Britons who tested positive for coronavirus infections between March 29 and May 23 of this year and whose samples were genetically sequenced.

The findings not only confirm that surges involving the Delta variant will drive more people into hospitals and strain medical resources: By implication, they suggest that when the variant attacks a population with large numbers of unvaccinated people, its victims become more acutely ill.

Its results may help explain why the United States is now admitting an average of 12,285 patients to hospitals each day — a rate that has climbed steadily since late July.