California’s summer COVID surge has proved to be particularly strong and enduring, surprising experts with its tenacity as it storms into a third month. The strength of this summer’s COVID surge probably is largely related to the ever-more infectious subvariants that continue to emerge as the coronavirus evolves, said Dr. Elizabeth Hudson, regional chief of infectious disease at Kaiser Permanente Southern California.
A dizzying number of related subvariants — collectively dubbed FLiRT — have emerged in recent months. One in particular, KP.3.
1.1, has been picking up steam at a startling pace and has become the most common strain nationwide. “KP.
3.1.1 seems to be the most adept at transmission,” said Dr.
Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious diseases expert at UC San Francisco. “And it’s the one that people think will continue to take over, not only in the United States, but ..
. around the world.” Coronavirus levels in California wastewater have surpassed the peaks seen in each of the last two summers, according to data estimates released Friday by the U.
S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which run through the week ending July 27. Coronavirus levels in sewage have been “high” or “very high” for eight consecutive weeks.
“This particular surge ...
is fairly robust and long-lasting, lasting a little longer than I thought that it would. It’s certainly very different from last summer,” Hudson said. California is one of 43 states, as well as the D.