Posted on 12/03/2022 12:57:52 AM PST by nickcarraway
California is seeing a sustained rise in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations, with numbers climbing at the same alarming rate that the state experienced ahead of previous COVID-19 surges.
Nearly a year to the day after the first case of the omicron variant in the United States was identified in a San Francisco resident, the daily number of newly reported cases in the state has climbed to 5,466, up 157% from a month earlier. More worryingly, new hospital admissions of patients with confirmed COVID are at 3,793, up 133% over the same period, according to health department data published Thursday.
With the third holiday season since the start of the pandemic under way and colder weather driving people indoors amid laxer attitudes, public health experts are bracing for another virus wave this winter. Hospitals are already under strain from two other infectious diseases this year — respiratory syncytial virus and the flu — that have come back with a vengeance.
Bay Area public health experts say they can’t predict how bad things will get, given the high level of overall immunity in the population from vaccination or prior infection. But they are concerned about the emergence of new omicron subvariants such as BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 that evade immunity more successfully than earlier strains, even as disappointingly small numbers of people have gotten the latest COVID vaccine booster shots.
“I think the holiday season is going to be a fertile ground for COVID to spread, a fertile ground for influenza to spread,” said Dr. Warner Greene, a senior investigator with the Gladstone Institutes. “I think we can expect to see both viruses increase. And so I think if you’re in those high-risk strata, you need to be very proactive and take strong steps to protect yourself.”
The number of people hospitalized with confirmed COVID-19 across the state as of Thursday marked the highest figure since the summer wave in August, while available intensive care unit beds have fallen below 1,900 for the first time since March.
The state’s seven-day rolling test positivity rate, which tracks the percentage of lab test results that are positive for COVID-19, has also topped 10% — more than doubling in a month.
“It’s hard to know where we are right now,” said Dr. John Swartzberg, a UC Berkeley infectious disease expert. “Things aren’t quite going in the right direction — they’re going in the wrong direction.”
The rapid spread of the immune-evasive subvariants adds to the concern. Together, the BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 offshoots drove nearly 6 in 10 new infections in the U.S. last week, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The agency has also started tracking the omicron XBB coronavirus subvariant, which drove surges across Asia this fall.
“There will almost certainly be a seasonal surge in the virus,” said Greene. “The dimensions of that are unclear. If XBB takes over, this is the most immune-evasive variant. It is now doubling in the United States at a rate of every 12 days. And one kind of suggests that it may push BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 aside. In that case, that is a highly, highly infectious virus and the boosters are not as effective.”
California’s seven-day average has reached about 13.6 new cases per 100,000 people, with the Bay Area region reporting roughly the same figure. That’s nearly twice the daily case rate at this time last year, which hovered at 7.8 per 100,000 people and ranged from 5.8 to 10 cases per 100,000 across the nine counties.
COVID-19 hospitalizations in the Bay Area are up 87% since October, reflecting a nationwide trend since the Thanksgiving weekend. The overall seven-day average of new daily admissions in the U.S. for all age groups is up 18% from a week ago, according to numbers updated overnight by the CDC.
“Two weeks from Thanksgiving, we’ll see what the Thanksgiving effect is,” said Swartzberg. “I think it’s going to probably accelerate — by how much I don’t know — but accelerate the number of cases and cause a rise in the number of hospitalizations.”
The agency’s national ensemble forecast predicts the number of new daily confirmed COVID-19 hospital admissions could rise as high as 11,000 patients on Dec. 23. California is likely to see up to 1,000 new admissions over the same period, based on state-level forecasts.
Less than three months after the updated bivalent boosters against COVID-19 became available, the seven-day average of Americans getting the shots has fallen to 223,730 per day after peaking at 605,655 per day last month, according to data from the CDC. About 12% of all those eligible and 31% of those over 65 nationwide have gotten the new doses, which are formulated to target the original virus and the omicron variant offshoots.
“I think people hear that the boosters are less effective than the vaccine used to be, and for some people they say therefore why do I need to get it?” said Dr. Bob Wachter, chief of medicine at UCSF. “And the answer is, it’s less effective than it was at preventing infection, but still remains extremely effective at preventing severe infection.”
In California, just 16% of those eligible have gotten the bivalent booster.
“We got spoiled early on that the vaccines were quite good at preventing infections for several months,” Greene said. “Now, with those immune-evasive variants, those antibodies are not as effective and so the immunity provided against infection is more short-lived. It wanes more quickly. So it puts people at greater risk for infection.”
No. They’re not.
Outright lie.
Shut it down.
Shut it all down.
Hard.
Nip it in the bud.
Nip it!
Quoting Chicken Little.
"COVID Positive Patients", that is CA hospital patients who test positive for COVID, is over double what it was last year. No surprise, since the current variants are so highly transmissible and the vaccines so ineffective. But how many of these patients are actually hospitalized FOR COVID? Who knows, but certainly not all of them and probably not the majority.
Another indicator, "COVID Positive ICU Patients" is less than HALF of what it was this time last year. Deaths are an even smaller fraction of what they were a year ago, at about 1/8th. So more people "positive", fewer people sick , and even fewer dying.
“ COVID Positive Patients”, that is CA hospital patients who test positive for COVID, is over double what it was last year. ”
You’re right but the above isn’t even true.
It’s much lower.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/usa/california/
11/29/22 - 2328 7 day average in CA
11/29/21 - 4548
These are all cases. I guess they’re saying hospital patients.
But they include anyone who test positive who aren’t in the hospital for Covid. It’s a dishonest presentation.
Whenever I see a headline that says "California" in the title (like "such and such is surging in CA"), I doubt the credibility of the article.
For all we know, Governor Newsom has required hospitals to show COVID as the official reason for all hospital admissions or suffer the consequences.
California has become the nation's crazy aunt who sees prowlers all over the neighborhood. There's just no reason to listen because, if you do, you get infected with her insanity. And as we all know, insanity is very contagious.;-)
What’s the false-positive rate of the test?
What’s the false-positive rate of the test for demes of humanity with different serological profiles?
Any headline or statistic or regulation based on the result of ‘tests’ is potentially meaningless without knowing the relevant false-positive rate.
Impossible! Mere months ago FJB proclaimed COVID to be “over!”
Seems to me that ‘government’ will soon be telling people “you will need a constant IV vaccine drip to be fully Covid-protected.” [’Protected’ meaning that the illness you get is less severe.]
Just
YAWN
Just
YAWN
it’s Cold & Flu Season, like every other year....
The CDC has admitted that the PCR tests is unable to determine the Covid-10 flu from the regular flu. So this is fear porn propaganda from the left.
What does it mean? California does not nearly enough hospitals.
Actually, that is begging the question. California is losing the best and brightest of its medical professionals to other localities where the practice of medicine is not nearly so burdened with prohibitions against cure of disease and the prolongation of the course of the diseases encountered, with artificialities like promoting the mRNA COVID-19 Wuhan virus injections as some kind of “cure” or “treatment” for conditions that are sometimes totally unrelated to the actual COVID-19 infection, and introducing their own form of mischief to the human anatomy.
So adding hospitals would be meaningless, as there would not be enough competent medical professionals to man them.
Epic fail of the delivery of medical services. Part of a multi-pronged effort to depopulate the planet.
They should probably close the state and euthanize everyone. It’s the only way to stop the spread.
What?? A huge scare article that doesn’t mention Gnome Fauci a single time? What are we coming to?
I won’t know what to believe until the Little Gnome tells me what to believe. Waiting with bated breath…
It’s not the test result that matters, it’s those counting the test results.
Diseased ridden san fran, any surprise here?
it’ll mean more mandates, lockdowns, masking, vax demands, travel restrictions, business closings to finish off destroying everyone who survived the first round.
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