COVID deaths declining, but continued spread worries health officials

May 8—ALBANY — Health officials dangled the carrot touting the benefits of being immunized for COVID-19 — individual protection and reducing the spread of the disease to family and friends and to the larger community — during a Friday news conference.

But they also displayed the stick, outlining how if the novel coronavirus is allowed to spread indefinitely it could mutate into a form that is far deadlier and much more transmissible.

In that potential future, the virus could shift to a form that kills younger people, including children, at a higher rate, said Dr. Charles Ruis, the health director for the Albany-based Southwest Public Health District 8-2, who encouraged residents to take advantage of available vaccines.

"The longer a virus is in a community and circulates, then that means the more opportunities to make genetic changes," he said. "Some of those changes that occur may not have much of an effect on the infections that they might cause.

"A genetic change may not make it more deadly, it may not make it more contagious, but it very well could."

In Dougherty County, there has been one death related to COVID-19 in the past two weeks, and there were three in March. Hospitalizations at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital were at 25 on Friday, with six in Americus.

Even as deaths and hospitalizations have decreased, the number of new cases has been increasing each week, Ruis said, in some weeks by as much as 30 or 40 percent from one week to the next. That shows that the virus is still hanging around and that spread increases the chance the virus has to go through genetic alterations.

"The virus we have among us now, it's deadly enough, but if we don't stamp it out, and let it hang around and continue to infect 147 people over a 14-day period on and on, then we run the risk that someday this virus will mutate into something that is far worse than anything we have ever seen," he said.

On the flip side of the coin is herd immunity, the point where so many people have immunity that the virus is unable to infect a new host and the spread is halted.

While health officials aren't sure what that magic percentage number is for the novel coronavirus, the more people protected, the less people will be infected until that threshold is reached.

"We have some choice in this matter," Ruis said. "We can let destiny control us, or we can use the tools we have and do the responsible thing and get vaccinated, and we will be more in control of our own destiny."

While encouraging that the number of hospitalizations has remained stable since they declined after the post-holiday spike, the fact that they haven't gone down over a period of months is worrying to medical officials.

"On the other hand, (its) being relatively stable shows this disease is prevalent in the community and we're likely to be dealing with it for a long time, especially if people don't get vaccinated," Dr. James Black, Phoebe's director of emergency medicine, said.

One worrying trend noted in recent weeks is that the hospitals are now treating more people who are younger.

During the early phases of the pandemic, the average age of patients treated by Phoebe was a little over 65, but now the average age is less than 50, Black said. And while younger people tend to have better outcomes, that is not the case for those with the underlying health conditions of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure, congestive heart failure, COPD and asthma.

Younger people also are those least likely to be vaccinated.

The Dougherty County Health Department has administered 8,900 doses, and in the 14 counties in the health district given shots to some 63,000 individuals.

Some 84 percent of those 65 and older have had at least one dose, but among the young it is a different story. For the 20-24 age group, only 8.8 percent had received at least one of the two shots, and for those 25-34, the rate was 26.8 percent.

The same lack of enthusiasm for getting vaccinated has been seen across the country.

"We're aware of that, and we're trying to take steps to encourage young people to get vaccinated," Ruis said.

Approval for the use of at least one of the available vaccines for those as young as 12 is expected in coming days.