COVID-19 levels are still high in South Carolina heading into winter virus season, with an increasing number of people seeking care in emergency rooms around the state and outbreaks continuing in nursing homes. Nationally, however, the peak of a summer surge may be past as winter virus season approaches and new COVID-19 vaccines will be available soon alongside flu shots, federal officials said. There were more than 1,500 COVID-related visits to emergency rooms around South Carolina for the week that ended Aug.
17, part of a steadily rising trend, and 28 COVID outbreaks in long-term care facilities, about the same as the previous two weeks, the Department of Public Health reported . "This year, the peak happened and it doesn’t seem to be going down," said Dr. Martha Buchanan, interim director for communicable disease prevention and control at the Public Health Department.
But based on wastewater virus detection and other sources, it looks like the country as a whole may be just past the peak of the current surge, said Dr. Mandy Cohen, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ER visits nationally declined 2.
6 percent compared to the previous week, the CDC reported . But "we're not out of the woods yet," said Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the CDC.
Looking ahead to the fall and winter, when not only COVID but the flu and respiratory syncytial virus will be infecting people, the CDC is predicting a "a similar or lower number of combined peak hospitalizations" from those viruses compared to last year, Cohen said. But that is based on assumptions that include people getting vaccinated, and lower rates could push the number of serious illnesses higher, she said. "The best plan going into this winter is for everyone to remain vigilant, to use the tools we have — vaccines, testing, treatment — against the illnesses responsible for the majority of fall and winter deaths and hospitalizations," Cohen said.
Vaccines against the currently circulating strains of the virus will soon be available after the Food and Drug Administration on Aug. 22 approved new versions from Pfizer and Moderna. And because the CDC and its advisory committee have already signed off on the vaccines to make sure they are ready for the start of winter respiratory virus season, with FDA approval, "Americans can start receiving their updated COVID-19 vaccines in the next couple of days," said James Mansi, Moderna's vice president of medical affairs for the United States.
The CDC is recommending that people get the updated vaccine in September or October, when many people traditionally get their flu shot, and patients can safely get both at the same time, Cohen said. "We want folks to get both," she said. While the COVID virus has become seemingly less virulent over time, it "continues to be a more dangerous virus than flu," she said.
COVID-19 levels are still high in South Carolina heading into winter virus season, with more than 1,500 virus-related visits to emergency rooms around the state in the past week and nearly 30 outbreaks in long-term care facilities. But newly reformulated vaccines are on the way. Story continues below The numbers bear her out: COVID caused more than 600,000 hospitalizations and over 45,000 deaths last year, Mansi said.
And then there is the specter of long COVID , symptoms and new health problems after the active infection that persist for at least three months and often much longer. It is hitting about 5 percent of the population right now, which is 14 million to 15 million people — including 200,000 in South Carolina alone, Mansi said. It includes otherwise young and healthy adults who are suffering a range of symptoms, such as brain fog and fatigue and breathing problems.
"That risk from long COVID increases with each COVID-19 infection, and that's regardless of severity," Mansi said. The updated vaccines are targeting the KP.2 strain currently circulating in the U.
S., where it and the closely associated strain KP.3 make up more than 77 percent of all strains identified in the latest CDC analysis .
The "updated vaccines will provide good protection against COVID-19 from the currently circulating variants as we transition into fall and head into 2025," said Dr. Peter Marks, director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research at the FDA. Moderna feels the updated vaccines will cover what is circulating "to provide that increased protection for Americans going into the fall and winter seasons ahead," Mansi said.
Much of the hospitalization and death occurs in those who are older or who have chronic health conditions, which is more than the majority of the U.S. population, Cohen said.
But no category is immune from severe disease, she said. "There is no group that is without risk," Cohen said. That includes the risk of long COVID, where studies have shown vaccination can decrease the risk of getting it by about 50 percent, Marks said.
There are effective treatments for both COVID-19 and flu, but both must be started early in the course of illness to be effective, which is why testing is important, Cohen said. To help with that, the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services will once again offer up to four free COVID tests per family through the COVIDTests.gov website beginning at the end of September. The CDC will also continue its COVID and flu monitoring, including keeping an eye out for avian influenza, which has popped up in some U.
S. dairy herds and caused mild infection in a handful of workers. Commercial labs will have the ability to test for bird flu this year, Cohen said.
And the CDC has proven it can rapidly pinpoint those cases should they pop in its ongoing flu testing, Daskalakis said. CDC testing "does continue to detect needles in haystacks," he said..
