Though ‘stealth’ omicron cases are climbing in Chicago, top doctor doubts another major surge is on the way: ‘I am not alarmed’
Chicago’s public health Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady said Thursday that the city’s outlook for weathering the recent increase in COVID-19 cases remains promising.
Cases of the highly contagious BA.2 subvariant of omicron — commonly known as “stealth omicron” — now make up 67.4% of new cases in the Midwest, Arwady said. That progression is coinciding with a rise in COVID-19 numbers in Chicago: In the past week, the city’s average daily caseload of positive tests has spiked 28%, landing at 304. The positivity rate has also ticked up to 1.7%.
But Arwady stressed in a news conference that the numbers remain under control compared to the previous winter surge of the original omicron variant that saw up to a 20% positivity rate and about 7,000 daily cases at one point.
“Right now, still, we are low,” Arwady said. “I am not alarmed, although our cases are rising. I’ve been talking to folks across the country, and we are not alone in this.”
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Early research suggests BA.2 spreads quicker than the original omicron, but it’s inconclusive whether it leads to more severe symptoms. The subvariant pummeled much of Europe and Asia last month, but recent data show cases are dropping in hot spots and that vaccines remain effective against serious illness and death.
BA.2 is called “stealth omicron” because it is harder to immediately discern whether a person infected by it has that specific coronavirus lineage or the delta variant, another highly infectious version of the coronavirus that hit the U.S. mid-2021. But current COVID-19 tests can still detect that a person with BA.2 is positive for the virus.
Arwady said the reason for her outlook is that Chicago’s prior experience with being hit hard by the original omicron variant, also known as BA.1, gives much of the population some immunity toward BA.2.
“The most important thing is to be vaccinated, especially in terms of preventing that severe illness,” Arwady said. “But with every passing day, I am more confident that in the very short term, we will avoid a major increase like we saw with the omicron surge.”
However, Arwady also noted that anyone over the age of 12 should be getting a booster shot, which only half of eligible Chicagoans have gotten. She noted that during the original omicron surge, Americans with a booster shot were 21 times less likely to die of COVID-19 than people who were not vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Earlier this year, Chicago officials celebrated the city emerging from the omicron variant surge, lifting its mask mandate for public indoor settings and in Chicago Public Schools, as well as its proof-of-vaccination requirement for indoor settings.
Arwady said Thursday that the city is not close to considering a return to any of those mitigations, but she outlined the new metrics for such scenarios.
For CPS to reinstate its mask mandate, the city must meet the “medium” risk level for COVID-19 as defined by the CDC guidance, she said. If the risk level jumps to “high,” then a mask requirement for most indoor public settings would return, along with a vaccine requirement for places such as restaurants and bars.
The CDC’s latest metrics for assessing a community’s COVID-19 risk looks at a mix of numbers for caseloads, hospital admissions and occupied inpatient beds.
If a region has fewer than 200 cases per 100,000 residents in the past week but has at least 20 COVID-19 hospital admissions per 100,000 residents, as well as at least 15% of its inpatient beds occupied by COVID-19 patients, then it is “high” risk. If the area has 200 or more positive cases, then it’s considered high risk if it has at least 10 hospitalizations and at least 10% of occupied inpatient beds.
“Medium” risk designation means a region has fewer than 200 cases per 100,000 residents in the past week — and there are between 10 to 19.9 COVID-19 hospital admissions per 100,000 residents as well as 10% to 14.9% of its inpatient beds occupied by COVID-19 patients. If the area has 200 or more positive cases, it would be medium risk if there are less than 10 hospitalizations and less than 10% of occupied inpatient beds.
