DaVita, the dialysis treatment company, had a soft Q1 as volume (treatments per day) in the US declined -0.6%, which was below management’s plan due to a number of external impacts. The KPI also decelerated QoQ by -30 bps, which compares to visits (Advan) slowing by -40 bps on a days-adjusted basis. Dynamics impacting Q1 were a harsh flu season and disruptive weather in Jan / Feb which resulted in missed treatments.

With all the adults over 16 now being eligible for COVID-19 vaccines, the U.S. is on track to vaccinate 70% of its population by mid to late June. The vaccination pace has been significantly increased on a weekly basis since the start back in the second half of December 2020, hitting now an average of over 3 million Americans getting vaccinated daily. In regards to the new COVID-19 cases, after the recent drop from the pick in January new cases have been plateaued, and most recently have started to tick up a bit.

With COVID cases rising again in Southern and Western states, the Washington Post reported that many hospitals are under renewed strain, with beds being filled to capacity. In order to measure the true number of hospital admissions, we have developed an algorithm that can track overnight stays for any period of time (by excluding staff and visitors). The chart below reflects the critical situation that hospitals are facing in light of rising case numbers.

In the past week, many states have started to see a resurgence in the number of COVID cases. In response to the need for more accurate data to monitor the pressure being placed on hospitals around the country, we have significantly enhanced our data on hospital admission. Our data is now more precise and, crucially it can also be broken down to show overnight stays over over 3 days to give a true picture of the number of beds being used.

Cellphone geolocation data has proven to be an invaluable tool in helping us understand how COVID-19 is evolving, and to support our recovery. We have been working closely with clients and other partners to help track the evolution of the pandemic and how it is impacting different sectors, among the most important of which is hospitals. To help visualize the environment that hospitals are operating under, as well as to provide a measure of hospital bed utilization which is an important metric of the available capacity of the hospitals, we generated a detailed analysis of hospital traffic, filtering out doctors, staff, and visits that did not result in long-term admissions, in order to estimate the actual hospital bed utilization during the pandemic.