MEDICO-STATISTICAL ANALYSIS OF THE INCIDENCE OF PNEUMONIA, INCLUDING THOSE CAUSED BY COVID-19 IN THE CHERNIVTSI REGION DURING 2018–2021

Abstract

One of the most urgent problems of modern health care is currently a viral infection caused by SARS-CoV-2, which has acquired both significant medical and social significance. The World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 pandemic on March 11, 2020. The disease is characterized by a polymorphism of the clinical picture from damage to the respiratory tract to pronounced intestinal manifestations, nevertheless, the most severe form remains viral pneumonia caused by COVID-19.
 The goal. Conducting a medical-statistical analysis of hospital morbidity and mortality from pneumonia caused by COVID-19 in the territory of Chernivtsi region according to the data of 2020-2021, with an overview of the dynamics of morbidity and mortality from pneumonia (J12-J16, J18) in 2018-2019.
 Object and research methods. The leading research method was the biostatistical method, which was used to confirm the representativeness of the sample population and statistical processing of the materials of form No. 20 for the Chernivtsi region, and data on the average annual population, obtained according to the data of the State Statistics Service of Ukraine (2018-2021).
 The results. COVID-19-induced pneumonia (IP) has significantly affected the pattern and incidence rate of upper respiratory tract diseases, increasing the proportion of pneumonia more than thrice. COVID-19 IP does not affect children which is to some extent related to the impossibility of transmitting the disease during the pre- and intrauterine periods. In 2020, the average mortality from COVID-19 among the adult population was 0.54‰ and in 2021 – 1.1‰. Mortality in the pre-COVID era, in turn, was not significant, did not exceed 0.015‰.
 Conclusions. The average mortality in 2021 exceeded the peak mortality of 2019 by 7.3 times which indicates the unpreparedness of the health care system for a challenge of a similar scale, which to a certain extent can be related to both the uncertainty regarding the issues of epidemiology, diagnosis and treatment of this disease and the imperfection of the health care system, which was at an intermediate stage of reformation.