COVID-19: In Hamilton County, hospitalizations rise again and officials plead anew for vaccination
Worried Hamilton County officials once more urged residents Wednesday to get vaccinated against COVID-19 as hospitalizations rise once more, a new variant first identified in South Africa could pose fresh difficulties, and the flu is picking up speed.
"Our numbers are going in the wrong direction, at a pretty good clip,"” said Hamilton County Commissioner Denise Driehaus. "It’s a little bit of a gut check."
Dr. Stephen Feagins, a specialist in viruses and the medical director for Hamilton County Public Health, said news of the omicron variant puts added pressures on exhausted health care providers. But genomic examination in Ohio shows so far “99% of circulating SARS-CoV-2 has been delta,” the variant that triggered the surge of the pandemic through late summer and early autumn.
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Feagins and county Health Commissioner Greg Kesterman said the new variant illustrates the need for more people to take on the vaccine against the virus. Feagins pointed out that in South Africa, where omicron was first detected last month, only about 5% to 8% of the population is vaccinated.
Feagins and Kesterman said that another two or three weeks are needed to learn more about omicron, but the virus appears to replicate faster and more efficiently than earlier versions of SARS-CoV-2. Vaccination slows viral replication, Feagins said, and after-vaccine infections occur with smaller amounts of virus, deterring replication and mutation.
“It’s a simple numbers thing,” Feagins said at the county’s periodic coronavirus briefing Wednesday.
Kesterman reported that 463 people with COVID-19 were in hospitals across the 14-county Cincinnati region, the highest number since early October. The number of positive tests in the region is now close to 10%, which means the virus is picking up speed in its spread.
The national vaccination campaign will be a year old this month, and Kesterman noted that Hamilton County has reached 72% vaccinated among residents age 5 and older. The Cincinnati region of 14 counties is at 68%. Kesterman acknowledged that communities of color remain among the most resistant to vaccination, and the county is working to open more access to vaccine in neighborhoods.
The usual cold-weather affliction, influenza, has begun its season at low levels, Kesterman said, but the strain circulating this year is troubling. H3N2 was the cause of the 2017-2018 flu epidemic in the United States, killing 70,000 people. “As we look to anticipate hospital levels, that has to be part of our calculation,” he said.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Hamilton County COVID-19 trends rising, officials plead for vaccination
