Daily Covid infections and deaths are starting to rise in the US after over a month of little activity – suggesting a BA.5 variant-fueled summer surge could now be underway.
America is seeing an average of 649 daily deaths from Covid, up 97 percent over the past week. It’s the biggest seven-day spike in deaths since early December.
Recorded infections have also jumped to 136,903 per day. It’s a 24 percent rise over seven days and the biggest daily case average since February – when America bailed out of the pandemic’s biggest Covid wave.
These strong increases are attributed to variant BA.5. The highly infectious strain of the virus that has quickly become the dominant strain in the United States.
While no other virus-related mandates are expected in the near future, Dr. Anthony Fauci, America’s top infectious disease expert Tuesday, reiterated to Americans to wear masks at indoor public gatherings.
The BA.5 strain now accounts for 65 percent of active cases in the United States, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Variant BA.5 (dark green) now accounts for 65% of active cases in the US, overtaking strain BA 2.12.1 (red), which now accounts for just 17% of cases. Variant BA.4 (light green) is responsible for 16% of US Covid cases
‘[BA.5 is] something we absolutely must take seriously. It has a transmission advantage over the predominant variant,” Fauci told MSNBC.
The variant is believed to be the most contagious form of Omicron to date. Early data from South Africa – where it was first discovered – also shows that it may be able to evade natural Covid immunity caused by previous infection.
This is particularly dangerous as many people who think they are temporarily safe from Covid because of a previous infection are suddenly vulnerable again.
It arrived alongside the BA.4 variant — also spotted in South Africa earlier this year — which now accounts for 16 percent of cases, according to CDC data.
The BA 2.12.1 variant, which was dominant before BA.5, now accounts for just 17 percent of cases and is being wiped out by the two new strains.
The rampant spread of the two new strains, and the rise in cases that come with them, have led officials like Fauci to recommend that Americans bring back some Covid measures they may already have been familiar with from the past two years.
“Everyone wants to leave this pandemic behind and feel and hope it doesn’t exist. It does, the good news is we have the ability and the tools to address it and we need to leverage those tools,” said Fauci, who serves as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease.
“For example, get vaccinated if you are not primarily vaccinated. If you’re busy for a booster, get a booster.
“And if you are in an area with high infection dynamics – and have talked about mandating anything – but recommending people wear a mask when they are indoors. These are easily doable things that can save us from having even more problems than we have now.”
Booster shots will likely soon include reformulated shots aimed at targeting the Omicron variant, as vaccine manufacturers plan to launch new shots in the coming months.
The vaccines currently available were formulated to combat the original Wuhan strain of the virus that broke out globally in early 2020.
Since then, the virus has mutated extensively, and the Omicron variant family has the ability to evade the protection from infection afforded by these shots.
However, some experts disagree on the need for Omicron-tailored syringes, as the protection from serious infection, hospitalization and death afforded by the original syringes is still effective against the highly infectious strain.
The states suffering the most from this latest wave of Covid are New Mexico and Nevada. Both desert states average 0.3 daily deaths per 100,000 inhabitants.
Daily Covid infections – a number that often precedes the rise in deaths by a few months – are rising the most in North Carolina, where daily infections have doubled over the past week.
Fauci pointed out that the New York area is a particular hotspot for the virus and even the first area to experience the next wave of the virus — as has often happened during the pandemic.
The number of cases in the Empire State has increased by 26 percent over the past two weeks, according to the latest available data.
In New York City, daily infections are up 28 percent, although hospitalizations and deaths remain limited due to the city’s high vaccine uptake.
dr Jay Varma, Mayor Bill de Blasio’s former public health adviser, warned last week that BA.5 could be why case numbers are starting to spike in the country’s largest city — and that it’s a sign of one could be further increase.
‘The decline in reported [COVID-19] Cases in NYC has stopped. Reported cases are on a high plateau, meaning actual transmission is very high considering the >20x undercount. This is likely the start of a BA.5 wave,” he said in a tweet.
The US often tends to lag behind the UK during the pandemic and experiences the same trends just weeks later.
The European nation was already suffering a BA.5-driven Covid surge and an analysis by M shows the surge may already have peaked.
Hospitalizations attributed to the virus are increasing by about 20 percent a week, according to the National Health Service, after the rate had previously risen by 40 percent a week.