Correct. The CDC estimated that only about a quarter of US infections were officially counted as cases.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd...

I'm also not sure that "case" and "patient" are being used as synonyms here?

That's _just_ the ventilator. The people who would die because they are suffocating on their own mucus in their lungs.

There's other ways to die from COVID19, such as heart attacks due to the disease, liver damage, etc. etc.