Evidence map›Paper›PMID 34267565›Full record

ArticleRisk management and healthcare policy2021

Can Comorbidity Data Explain Cross-State and Cross-National Difference in COVID-19 Death Rates?

Jeffrey C Cegan, Benjamin D Trump, Susan M Cibulsky, Zachary A Collier, Christopher L Cummings, Scott L Greer, Holly Jarman, Kasia Klasa, Gary Kleinman, Melissa A Surette and 2 more

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Risk management and healthcare policy, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
5citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

5 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. How Will AI Shape the Future of Pandemic Response? Early Clues From Data Analytics.Risk analysis : an official publication of the Society for Risk Analysis · 2025
    Review
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. Observational
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

12 authors.

Jeffrey C CeganUS Army Engineer Research and Development Center, US Army Corps of Engineers, Vicksburg, MS, USA.
Benjamin D TrumpUS Army Engineer Research and Development Center, US Army Corps of Engineers, Vicksburg, MS, USA.
Susan M CibulskyUS Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, Boston, MA, USA.
Zachary A CollierRadford University, Davis College of Business and Economics, Department of Management, Radford, VA, USA.
Christopher L CummingsNorth Carolina State University, Genetic Engineering and Society Center, Raleigh, NC, USA.
Scott L GreerUniversity of Michigan, School of Public Health, Department of Health Management and Policy, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
Holly JarmanUniversity of Michigan, School of Public Health, Department of Health Management and Policy, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
Kasia KlasaUS Army Engineer Research and Development Center, US Army Corps of Engineers, Vicksburg, MS, USA.ORCID 0000-0002-4468-3603
Gary KleinmanUS Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, Boston, MA, USA.
Melissa A SuretteFederal Emergency Management Agency, Region I, Boston, MA, USA.
Emily WellsUS Army Engineer Research and Development Center, US Army Corps of Engineers, Vicksburg, MS, USA.
Igor LinkovUS Army Engineer Research and Development Center, US Army Corps of Engineers, Vicksburg, MS, USA.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Many efforts to predict the impact of COVID-19 on hospitalization, intensive care unit (ICU) utilization, and mortality rely on age and comorbidities. These predictions are foundational to learning, policymaking, and planning for the pandemic, and therefore understanding the relationship between age, comorbidities, and health outcomes is critical to assessing and managing public health risks. From a US government database of 1.4 million patient records collected in May 2020, we extracted the relationships between age and number of comorbidities at the individual level to predict the likelihood of hospitalization, admission to intensive care, and death. We then applied the relationships to each US state and a selection of different countries in order to see whether they predicted observed outcome rates. We found that age and comorbidity data within these geographical regions do not explain much of the international or within-country variation in hospitalization, ICU admission, or death. Identifying alternative explanations for the limited predictive power of comorbidities and age at the population level should be considered for future research.

Indexed as

comorbidityCOVID-19health outcomesmortality rates

Identifiers

PMID34267565
PMCPMC8275866

What Socratic holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY-NC
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.