Here is your typical misleading scare tactic headline, in this case from yesterday’s Washington Post:

BREAKING NEWS

Are we all going to end up hospitalized or dead?

Well, the UCSF hospital system just conducted a comprehensive analysis of their hospital admittances and found that 70% of the “COVID count” are patients who are in the hospital for reasons totally unrelated to COVID, but happen to test positive.

After reviewing the charts of every COVID-positive patient at UCSF hospitals on Jan. 4, Dr. Jeanne Noble, an associate professor of emergency medicine at UCSF, determined that two of three of them were in the hospital for other reasons.

“The real COVID crisis that our hospitals are facing is a severe staffing shortage that is compromising the quality of our care,” says Dr. Jean Noble, an author of the report who is an associate professor of emergency medicine at UCSF. “The crisis we are suffering in the Bay Area is largely driven by disruptive COVID policies that encourage asymptomatic testing and subsequent quarantines. The vast majority of COVID-plus patients I take care of need no medical care and are quickly discharged.”

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/COVID-San-Francisco-staff-shortage-UCSF-16758335.php

Here’s the California hospital chart in the format we prefer: