Summary

• In week 52 (December 21–27, 2020), emergency room visits increased among children under 2 years of age (+6%, or +973 visits), remained stable among those aged 75 and older, and decreased among those aged 2–14 (-25%, or -10,551 visits) and those aged 15–74 (-4%, or -6,660 visits). Hospitalizations following emergency department visits are down across all age groups (-4%, or -2,475 visits).

• In Week 52, visits for suspected COVID-19 across all age groups continued to rise for the second consecutive week, though at a more moderate rate than in Week 51 (+2% versus +10% in Week 51). This increase primarily affected those aged 75 and older (+5%, or +88 visits). In other age groups, visits decreased among those under 15 (-24%, or 23 fewer visits) and remained stable among those aged 15–74. In Week 52, suspected COVID-19 remains the third most common diagnosis among those aged 75 and older and the seventh most common among those aged 15–74. In total, 5,253 visits were recorded in Week 52 (vs. 5,156 visits in Week 51—consolidated data as of 12/29/2020). The share of visits for COVID-19 in total activity rose very slightly to 2.4% (vs. 2.2% in Week 51), and the proportion of hospitalizations following a visit across all age groups remained stable at 53%. At the regional level, visits for suspected COVID-19 are up in Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (+41%, or +208 visits), Île-de-France (+8%, or +73 visits), Bourgogne-Franche-Comté (+10%, or +40 visits), Nouvelle-Aquitaine (+7%, or +22 visits), and French Guiana (+48%, or +10 visits). Visits are stable in Grand-Est and Occitanie and declining in other regions (from -4% in Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes to -31% in Brittany).

• Since monitoring began on February 24, 2020, 315,783 emergency room visits for suspected COVID-19 have been recorded.

• Among seasonal conditions, the main increases were observed for ENT conditions across all age groups (+12%, or +801 visits), bronchiolitis (+17%, or +91 visits among children under 2 years old), and conjunctivitis (+52%, or +78 visits) among children, asthma (+18%, or +96 visits) among those aged 15–74, vomiting (+17%, or 144 visits) and gastroenteritis (+25%, or 156 visits) among adults.

• Among the most common conditions, there was an increase in visits for chickenpox (results not shown) and foreign bodies in children (+13%, or +75 visits) and urinary tract infections (+11%, or +257 visits) in those aged 15–74.