This series of articles present key COVID-19 data and real stories from three populous cities in the world: Shanghai, New York and Sydney. Daily numbers of cases, last 7-days & 28-days daily average hospitalizations and deaths etc across the three cities are summarized and compared as practical as possible. The list of cities, key measures and comparisons are not intended to be exhaustive. They are intended to inform and engage audiences who are interested in COVID-19 related responses, experiences and solutions in these big cities and beyond. 欢迎通过以下电子邮件地址给本文作者李林博士提供反馈 You are welcome to send any of your feedback to Dr. Lin Li at： linli2011@icloud.com .
China’s most populous city and financial hub, Shanghai, has been under strict lockdown since late March 2022 in an effort to control its biggest COVID-19 outbreak since the pandemic started over two years ago. Omicron variant and its subvariants, including BA.1.1, have been driving the current surge. The country’s most cosmopolitan city, with a population of more than 25 million, Shanghai has recorded over 20,000 daily new coronavirus infections for 11 consecutive days since April 7. It reported 24,820 new cases (including confirmed and probable cases) on April 17 alone (see the graph below).
(Source: Shanghai Municipal Health Commission. The graph was prepared by Dr. Lin Li 李林博士 on April 18, 2022.)
It is worth mentioning that on April 18 a press release from Shanghai Municipal Health Commission said three elderly people have died from COVID-19 in Shanghai for the first time since the financial hub entered lockdown in late March, 2022.
The largest city in the United States (US), New York City (NYC), with a population of 8.5 million, has been the national hot spot the last few weeks. Two highly transmissible versions of Omicron subvariant BA.2 (ie, BA.2.12 and BA.2.12.1) are circulating rapidly in central part of New York state and surrounding regions. Being aware of the daily fluctuations in new cases, if we compare the summary data for the last seven days to the last 28 days, we can see daily average COVID-19 cases are increasing in NYC, from a daily average of about 1,500 cases (last 28 days daily average) to 2,122 cases (last 7 days), whereas hospitalizations are stable (the daily average is about 28, see the table below), and confirmed deaths are decreasing.
Daily average new cases in New York are much lower than Shanghai (this is also the case for hospitalizations, at least in the last two weeks).
An Australian jurisdiction, New South Wales (NSW), has a similar population to that of NYC. NSW has 8.2 million residents as of 31 December 2020. Because the majority of NSW’s population (64.5%) live in Greater Sydney, and because COVID-19 related data from NSW are readily available to the author of the article (and the public), relevant statistics from NSW are used for Sydney for the purpose of this article (and subsequent ones in the same series).
Omicron has hit NSW hard since December 2021. Currently, Omicron subvariant BA.2 is accounting for about 97% of COVID-19 cases in NSW. A mixture of the Delta and the Omicron variants, Deltacron, was first detected in NSW about a week ago. Compared to NYC, Sydney’s (and other parts of NSW’s) daily average COVID-19 case numbers are much higher (7-days average was 16,943 cases in NSW vs 2,122 cases in NYC; and 28-days average: 19,616 vs 1,543; updated on April 15). Similarly, the daily average hospitalizations are much higher in Sydney, compared to New York (7-days average: 1,526 vs 28, the 28 days average: 1,326 vs 29).
Data also show average daily new cases in Sydney (NSW) are decreasing, from about 20,000 per day in the 1st week of April (also see the last 28 days daily average) to about 17,000 per day in the 2nd week of April. (However, the hospitalizations are still increasing in Sydney).
The trend in Sydney’s daily cases is different to that of Shanghai and New York where the daily average cases are increasing (not decreasing) during the comparable period, as mentioned earlier.
It would be of great interest to continue to follow the development and trends of COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths across these three populous cities in the coming weeks and months.
You are welcome to send your comments and suggestions to Dr. Lin Li at linli2011@icloud.com . Thank you.
Real stories
Shanghai residents waiting for their PCR tests, April 9, 2022. Source: Mr Pang of Pudong District, Shanghai; and internet.
More pictures and stories from the selected cities will be shared in the upcoming articles of this series.
The author of this article, Dr. Lin Li, is a public health professional in Melbourne, Australia. Many years ago, he received an international scholarship funded by a foundation in New York, the United States. He left the Chinese disease control system where he had worked for several years, and did his PhD in public health at the University of Melbourne, with the support from the scholarship from New York. Over the past 10 years, Dr Li has been conducting public health research projects and international cooperation, including promoting health cooperation and exchanges between China, the United States, Australia and other countries. (More information about his work can be found through the following links: https://bit.ly/LinLiEPorforlio2022https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/2sUgOmjAmVgqRijz7N1DMg , https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2679187/)
(BY DR LIN LI. E-mail: linli2011@icloud.com. Website: https://www.eastwestpartners.org/ . E-Portforlios: https://bit.ly/LinLiEPorforlio2022)
Main sources
Shanghai Municipal Health Commission. http://wsjkw.sh.gov.cn/yqtb/index.html
New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. COVID-19: Data.
https://www1.nyc.gov/site/doh/covid/covid-19-data.page#sum
New South Wales Government. COVID-19 (Coronavirus).
https://www.health.nsw.gov.au/Infectious/covid-19/Pages/stats-nsw.aspx#today
New South Wales Government. Key facts about NSW. https://www.nsw.gov.au/about-nsw/key-facts-about-nsw.
https://www.health.ny.gov/press/releases/2022/2022-04-13_covid-19.htm
https://www1.nyc.gov/site/doh/covid/covid-19-data.page#daily
https://bit.ly/ShanghaiAus26millionsPebbleEng