As a precaution against what will surely be misreported by the press, here is a thought experiment with some numbers.
The UK is reporting a doubling time of 2 days. Suppose there are 100 Omicron cases now, then in 2 weeks we would have 12,800 people testing positive on a given day if everyone was tested. (Seven doublings means multiply by 2*2*2*2*2*2*2 = 128 = 2^7 . ) Suppose, as may very be true, that Omicron is substantially less virulent than Delta. Let’s assume a hospitalization rate of say 1% instead of Delta’s 2.3% which will happen 2 weeks after a positive test. (Hospitalizations lag positive tests by about 2 weeks for all versions of Covid so far). Then, from our initial 100 cases, there would only be one hospitalization in the two weeks that follow because 1% of a 100 is 1!
But what does this mean? Should we say that Omicron doesn’t seem to result in any significant hospitalizations? Of course not, the signal is hidden in the noise. But I betcha that we can expect some of the more innumerate press to say that Omicron has “a vanishingly small chance of being hospitalized”. After all, 1/12,800 is pretty darn small – it just isn’t what is going on.