Weekly News From Los Alamos County
July 21, 2022
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Inside this newsletter, you will find...
The Epidemiology Corner - COVID-19 Update, Upcoming Community Briefing, Cases Rising in Seniors, Symptoms Changing with Omicron, Vaccine Effectiveness, Survey & Results, COVID-19 data, and much more.
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COVID-19 Update: President Biden Tests Positive as BA.5 Predominates and Transmission Remains High...
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Highly Immune-Evasive BA.5 Variant Outcompeting All Other Variants as Hospitalizations Rise
For the week ending July 16, CDC estimates that Omicron variants BA.4/BA.5 account for 91% of US cases nationwide, with BA.5 alone predominating at 80% prevalence and the only variant continuing to increase in prevalence. See HERE. Barring the emergence of new and more competitive SARS-CoV-2 variants, Omicron BA.5 is expected to account for virtually all US cases sometime in August. Health authorities are warning that neither full vaccination and/or past infection with a prior variant provide much protection against BA.5 infection. On July 21, the White House announced that President Biden tested positive for COVID-19 despite being fully vaccinated with two booster shots. See HERE. The 79-year old President is in a high-risk group by virtue of his older age and has begun taking the oral anti-viral Paxlovid to reduce risks of severe illness. See HERE. Up-to-date vaccination and prompt use of oral anti-virals among eligible cases is expected to provide good protection against BA.5 severe disease, hospitalization, and death. Rising COVID-19 hospitalization in the U.S. is thought to be more a consequence of rising infection rates rather than greater virulence from BA.5. See HERE.
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COVID-19 in the County: Community Transmission Declining But Still Comparatively High
Average daily reported COVID-19 cases remain comparatively high despite a declining trend following the peak case reporting seen in early June. For the week ending July 19, an average of 8 cases per day were reported, which is about 8-10 times higher than the average 0-1 daily cases reported during much of March, 2022. Avoidance of BA.5 infection during times of high community transmission, as is occurring now in the county, will likely require individual and group mitigation efforts that include masking and social distancing. See HERE.
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CDC Community Level Risk MEDIUM But Infection Risk Remains Comparatively High
For the week ending July 19, the CDC Community Level remains at MEDIUM due to Health Services Area (HSA) hospitalization metrics being below CDC threshold criteria levels. County transmission rates remain above the CDC criteria threshold of 200 cases per 100,000, but have now declined to a level comparable with those seen in the three neighboring HSA counties (Santa Fe, Taos, Rio Arriba). The CDC rationale for relying mainly on hospitalization metrics to establish Community Level public health recommendations is available HERE.
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County Wastewater Surveillance Data
The county is participating in a CDC-sponsored project to monitor SARS-CoV-2 virus levels in municipal wastewater. Personnel at the Los Alamos and White Rock wastewater treatment facilities collect bi-weekly inflow samples which are sent to a CDC contractor (Biobot Analytics) for analysis. Biobot reports virus concentration levels (viral copies per milliliter of sewage) as well as variant proportions. Sampling began the week of June 15 and is now current through the week of July 13. Biobot data for the Los Alamos wastewater treatment facility can be accessed online HERE. The same data, but normalized to population size, can be accessed at the CDC wastewater surveillance site HERE. Data for the White Rock treatment facility are not publicly available. As shown in the graph below, wastewater sampling began only after the current case wave was well underway, but now appears to be roughly tracking the declining side of the case wave. Biobot genomic sequencing, which provides a profile of detected virus by variant type, indicates that the highly immune-evasive BA.5 variant may have accounted for an estimated 66% of cases occurring in the county during the week ending June 29, reported or otherwise. This suggests that BA.5 was likely responsible for the sizeable jump in case numbers reported in early June, however, there is no data to determine when BA.5 was first introduced into the county nor its precise trajectory thereafter. It is reasonable to assume that BA.5 is accounting for the majority of COVID-19 cases occurring in the county now, as well as into the near-term future.
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NOTE: The COVID-19 incidence data reviewed here are based on PCR-confirmed testing results compiled by CDC and NMDOH and do not include data on positive at-home antigen tests. As such, case counts are likely underestimated, but how much cannot be determined at any given time point.
To assist with more complete case monitoring in New Mexico, NMDOH provides for online reporting of positive at-home antigen results HERE.
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COVID-19 community briefing on July 28
Los Alamos County officials announced that it will hold a virtual briefing regarding the community’s COVID-19 status on Thursday, July 28 at 5:30 p.m. with representatives from the county, Los Alamos Public Schools, Los Alamos Retired and Senior Organization, Los Alamos Commerce & Development Corporation, and retired epidemiologist William Athas, PhD.
Members of the public can join using the following Zoom link: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89699155842. After a brief presentation, meeting representatives will answer questions from the public.
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Covid’s risks are concentrated among Americans of Biden’s age.
President Biden is 79, and Americans his age and older have made up larger and larger shares of those dying from Covid in recent months. The virus has taken advantage of falling immunity caused by the time elapsed since many older people’s last vaccinations, and the Omicron variant has evolved a growing ability to skirt the body’s defenses.
Covid has been killing substantially fewer Americans of all ages this summer than it did during the peak of the wintertime Omicron wave. Still, older people remain at significantly higher risk.
As of early June, four times as many Americans ages 75 to 84 were dying each week from the virus compared with people two decades younger, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Those death counts are provisional, the C.D.C. cautioned, because they were based on death certificates and did not account for all deaths in those age groups.)
That is an even bigger age gap than existed at the peak of the Omicron wave this winter. Then, the number of people aged 75 to 84 killed by Covid each week was twice as high as the number aged 55 to 64.
The president received a second booster shot in late March, significantly reducing his risk of severe illness. This spring, people 50 and older who had received a single booster were dying from Covid at four times the rate of those with two booster doses, the C.D.C. has reported.
In 2022, Covid deaths, though always concentrated in older people, have skewed toward older people more than they did at any point since vaccines became widely available. Many older people were vaccinated early in 2021, and among those who have not yet received a booster shot, immune defenses generated by the shots have significantly waned.
In contrast, middle-aged Americans, who suffered a large share of pandemic deaths last summer and fall, are benefiting from greater stores of immune protection from both vaccination and prior infections.
While Covid deaths remain far lower than in the winter, they are climbing again among older people as the immune-evasive Omicron subvariant known as BA.5 causes more infections, according to the latest C.D.C. data. From early May to early June, the number of Americans ages 75 to 84 dying from Covid each week increased by nearly 50 percent.
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How COVID-19 symptoms are changing: A sore throat and hoarse voice became top symptoms with newer variant
The top symptoms of the Omicron COVID-19 variant may differ from symptoms that were common at the start of the pandemic. Omicron may also be less severe than the Delta variant, a study out of the U.K. found.
People with Omicron often report sore throat and a hoarse voice, which were not as prevalent in Delta cases, a Zoe Health Study found. This is true for vaccinated and unvaccinated patients.
People who contracted the Omicron variant were less likely to be hospitalized compared to those with the Delta variant, Zoe Health said in a press release about the study. Symptoms also lasted for shorter periods – an average of 6.87 days, compared to 8.89 days.
Earlier COVID-19 variants often caused people to lose their sense of smell. The study found that symptom appeared in less than 20% of cases and often days after the first symptoms began. Other serious symptoms that used to be prevalent – like fever, headaches, brain fog and eye soreness – are less prevalent in Omicron cases. However, they can still occur.
The Zoe Health Study, which was supported by grants from the U.K. Government Department of Health and Social Care, tested people in the U.K. who were vaccinated. They tested participants between June 1 and November 27, 2021 – when the Delta variant was dominant – and between Dec. 20, 2021 to Jan. 17, 2022 – when the Omicron variant dominated.
The study collected 62,002 positive tests and looked at those patients' symptoms. In addition to a difference in the length and types of symptoms between the two variants, researchers said Omicron is found far less frequently in the lower respiratory tract. This is where infection can cause more severe symptoms, potentially sending people to the hospital.
They also found Omicron symptoms do not last as long in vaccinated people.
Delta is better at infecting lung cells than Omicron, the study found. And while Omicron appears to be much more transmissible than previous variants, this variant affects fewer organs than Delta, other studies have found, according to Zoe Health.
The Omicron subvariant that was prevalent at the end of 2021 and the start of 2022 was labeled BA.1. There are now Omicron subvariants, labeled BA.4 and BA.5 that appear to be causing a loss of sense of smell or taste again, Dr. Celine Gounder told CBS News.
A similar study from Imperial College London also found that there was lower reporting of loss of sense of smell and taste for the Omicron variant. However, the study which is yet to be peer-reviewed, found there was higher reporting of cold-like and influenza-like symptoms.
The study used data from REACT-1, a widespread survey in the U.K. that collected at-home COVID-19 tests from about 1.5 million participants between 2020 to 2022, and analyzed how symptoms differed between variants and subvariants.
While it is perceived that newer variants like Omicron are milder, Omicron subvariant BA.2 was associated with reporting more symptoms, with greater disruption to daily activities, than the Omicron subvariant BA.1.
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If you had COVID-19, did you lose your sense of taste and smell?
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Yes, but I didn't test positive
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No, but I did have COVID-19
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I have not been sick with COVID-19
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The risk from the coronavirus is rising in much of the United States.
In just eight weeks, the Omicron subvariant known as BA.5 has gone from a blip in United States case counts to the dominant version of the coronavirus in the country, now making up more than three-quarters of new cases. Perhaps the most transmissible subvariant yet, BA.5 is driving increases in positive tests, hospitalizations and intensive care admissions across the country.
As of Wednesday, an average of roughly 127,700 known coronavirus cases and 426 deaths were being reported each day in the United States, according to a New York Times database, a marked increase from early July.
Known infections are rising in at least 40 states, particularly in the Great Plains, West and South. Hospitalizations have increased by 19 percent over the past two weeks, and more than 41,800 people are now in American hospitals with the coronavirus on an average day.
The popularity of home testing means that reported cases are now even more of an undercount of the true infection rate than they were in the pandemic’s earlier waves. The share of all tests that come back positive is also rising faster. Federal data show that the risk of catching the virus is increasing in much of the country.
The C.D.C.’s assessment last week of community risk levels, using a hospitalization-based metric, puts about 35 percent of United States counties in the “high risk” category, but those counties are home to about 55 percent of the American population.
In such high-risk areas, the agency recommends wearing masks in public indoor settings. But there are no statewide universal mandates now in force.
President Biden’s coronavirus response team warned Americans last week that they must do more to protect themselves against Covid-19.
Still, many Americans have turned their attention away from the pandemic, and many health officials have grown more hesitant to sound the alarm.
The rapid evolution of the coronavirus into an alphabet soup of subvariants helped push the Food and Drug Administration to advise vaccine makers to update their coronavirus vaccines for a booster campaign in the fall. The updates would be intended to make the vaccines more effective against the highly contagious Omicron subvariants that are causing the current surge
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New COVID-19 Vaccine Effectiveness Data Showcase Protection Gained by 3rd and 4th Doses
A third and fourth COVID-19 vaccine dose offered substantial protection among adults with healthy immune systems who were eligible to receive them during Omicron variant evolution in early 2022, according to a new MMWR published today. The findings of this study, in conjunction with recently published data showing people infected with BA.2 may also have antibodies that can protect against illness with BA.5, suggest that currently available vaccines may provide protection against serious illness caused by the currently circulating BA.5 variant.
To evaluate effectiveness of 2, 3, and 4 doses of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines (Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna) among adults with healthy immune systems, experts examined VISION Network data on more than 214,000 emergency department/urgent care visits and more than 58,000 hospitalizations with a COVID-19–like illness diagnosis in 10 U.S. states from mid-December 2021 through mid-June 2022. Study findings show:
- When BA.1 was the predominant variant, vaccine effectiveness (VE) was 61% for two doses against COVID-19-associated hospitalizations; VE increased to between 85%–92% after receipt of a third/booster dose.
- When BA.2/BA.2.12.1 became predominant, vaccine effectiveness with two doses was 24% against COVID-19-associated hospitalizations and increased to 52%–69% after a third/booster dose.
- Patterns were similar for emergency department and urgent care encounters, with lower VE during BA.2/BA.2.12.1 predominance and higher VE with 3 or 4 doses compared to VE with 2 doses.
- Among adults ages 50 years and older during BA.2/BA.2.12.1, vaccine effectiveness against COVID-19–associated hospitalization was 55% more than 4 months after a booster/third dose and increased to 80% more than a week after the fourth dose
COVID-19 vaccines remain our single most important tool to protect people against serious illness, hospitalization, and death. Getting vaccinated now will not prevent you from getting an authorized variant-specific vaccine in the fall or winter when they are recommended for you. Given recent increases in deaths and hospitalizations associated with the BA.5 variant, everyone should stay up to date with recommended COVID-19 vaccinations, including additional booster doses for those who are moderately to severely immunocompromised and adults over 50.
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CDC COVID Data Tracker - July 21, 2022
To get today's break down of positive case data, demographics information, vaccine status and more for Los Alamos County or other counties across the United States, click HERE
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The charts available with this TOOL layout the key metrics for understanding the reach and severity of COVID-19 in a given area.
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Johns Hopkins
COVID-19 Status Report Dashboard for
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NMDOH Epidemiology Reports - Daily and Weekly Data
As part of the COVID-19 pandemic response, NMDOH collects and analyzes statewide data for COVID-19 positive cases, hospitalizations, and deaths. The reports reflect these critical data and are updated weekly - click HERE
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QUESTION:
Do you know what happens if you are traveling domestically and contract COVID-19 while you are away from home? Do the airlines allow you to change your flight rather than get on the plane with COVID-19? Do they simply cancel your ticket and you have to buy a new one?
ANSWER:
At this time there are no requirements when traveling domestically, only recommendations (see HERE).
The choice to cancel or travel anyway is up to the individual traveler. It is recommended to call your airline and ask what their policy is, since these may change airline to airline.
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We are listening to you!
Your feedback is helping to shape future newsletters, inform decisions regarding services, and make Los Alamos County healthier and safer. Make sure to participate each week to be heard!
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Remember, we appreciate your questions! We always try to respond in a timely manner, and if appropriate, we will include those Q&As in future newsletters.
Take a look at these results from the last survey:
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Los Alamos Vaccine & Booster Information |
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Los Alamos County Vaccine/Booster Resources
Visit the County COVID Page for information regarding vaccinations/boosters, click below:
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Los Alamos Testing Information |
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Los Alamos County Testing Resources
Visit the County COVID Page for information regarding testing, click below:
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Have a question? Email us. |
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