Covid-19 numbers keep soaring as travelers scatter back across the country after Christmas and Americans prepare for another holiday weekend, reports CNN.
Soaring cases in US
The US is now averaging 198,404 new Covid-19 cases each day, according to Sunday data from Johns Hopkins University. That’s 47% higher than a week ago and the highest such number since January 19.
“I think we’re going to see half a million cases a day — easy — sometime over the next week to 10 days,” CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner told CNN on Sunday.
About 71,000 Americans were hospitalized with Covid-19 as of Sunday, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services.
And an average of 1,408 Americans died from Covid-19 each day during the week ending Sunday, according to Johns Hopkins. That’s a 17% increase from the prior week.
With the highly contagious Omicron variant, “We’re certainly going to continue to see a surge (in cases) for a while,” Dr. Anthony Fauci told CNN on Monday.
New Year parties
Looking ahead to New Year’s Eve on Friday, small gatherings of fully vaccinated people will be safe, Fauci said. But he advised people to avoid large parties where they don’t know the vaccination status of all guests.
“When you are talking about a New Year’s Eve party where you have 30, 40, 50 people celebrating, you do not know the status of the vaccination, I would recommend strongly: Stay away from that this year,” said Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
“There will be other years to do that. But not this year.”
More children are getting hospitalized with Covid-19
Pediatric Covid-19 hospitalizations keep rising, and they’re nearing the record high set in early September.
It’s an indication of just how quickly the new Omicron variant is spreading in the community, Dr. Roberta DeBiasi said. But so far, she said, the affected children are not any sicker than they were when previous variants circulated. There are just more of them.
The Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago reported the number of children testing positive is “incredibly high,” Dr. Larry Kociolek, an attending physician and infectious disease specialist there, told CNN on Monday.
“Hospitalizations have quadrupled over our baseline over the past week,” Kociolek told CNN. “Fortunately, a lot of these infections are either mild infections or incidental positives, since we screen all children before procedures and at the time of admission, and we’ve actually not seen any change in the number of children being admitted to the ICU.”
Half of the hospitalizations were in children younger than 5, Kociolek said. Children in that age group are not yet eligible to be vaccinated.
New York City enacts new vaccine mandate
New York state broke a single-day record for new Covid-19 cases, with 49,708 new Covid-19 cases reported on Christmas Eve, according to data released on Sunday by Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office.
“As we come home from holiday gatherings, it is as important as ever to take precautions to limit the spread of COVID-19 this season,” Hochul said in a statement. “The vaccine is the best tool we have to keep ourselves and our loved ones safe as we head into the new year.”
The average number of daily new Covid-19 cases in New York City skyrocketed 644% in the past two weeks to 19,268, according to The New York Times.
The highly contagious Omicron variant was a factor in New York Mayor Bill de Blasio’s decision to implement a vaccine mandate for private sector employees, effective Monday.
Children ages 5 to 11 in New York are now also required to show proof of at least one shot before being allowed into indoor dining, fitness or entertainment venues. And adults must show proof of two vaccinations for those areas.
The private-sector requirements align with those already in place for the city’s public sector employees and similar restrictions in major cities around the country.
The city is still planning a “scaled back” New Year’s Eve celebration.
CDC reduces isolation time for asymptomatic people with Covid-19
As more hospitals get overwhelmed, the CDC has issued new guidance that will allow some health care workers who get Covid-19 to return to work more quickly. Medical workers who test positive but don’t have symptoms can go back to work in seven days if they test negative within 48 hours of their return to work.
But the new guidelines are only for health care workers. On Monday, the CDC also updated its recommended isolation and quarantine period for the general population.
The CDC shortened the recommended time for isolation from 10 days for people with Covid-19 to five days, if asymptomatic, followed by five days of wearing a mask when around others.
The CDC also updated its recommended quarantine period for those exposed to Covid-19.
For those who are unvaccinated, have not had a second mRNA dose in more than six months or have not had a booster shot, the CDC recommends quarantining for five days followed by strict mask use for an additional five days.
People who have received their booster shot do not need to quarantine if they are exposed to Covid-19, but they should wear a mask for 10 days after exposure, the statement read.
The CDC said it “continues to evaluate isolation and quarantine recommendations for the broader population as we learn about the Omicron variant and will update the public as appropriate.”
The emergency guidance for health care workers was made because of concerns about the Omicron variant and potential staff shortages, the CDC said.
About 75% of all ICU beds in the country were in use and about 21% were occupied by Covid-19 patients, according to Sunday data from the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Holiday travelers are stranded as Omicron surges
Thousands of flights were canceled over the holiday weekend — partly due to winter weather but largely due to reduced airline staffing as employees called out sick.
More than 2,000 flights were canceled Monday, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. That’s on top of roughly 1,200 Sunday flights that were canceled.
And at least four ocean cruise ships were turned away from ports or prohibited from letting passengers disembark this past week because of Covid-19 cases on board.
Sporting events have also been postponed or canceled because of increased spread of Covid-19. At least five college football bowl games have been affected, including two games called off over the weekend. Pro basketball and hockey also have been slowed by the virus.
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Source: CNN
