When Delta Air Lines referred to Covid-19 as a “common seasonal virus” after a federal judge struck down the Biden administration’s mask mandate for public transportation, they were partially right: There is some evidence that it is seasonal. But it is far from common and still not the same as the flu.
The lifting of mask mandates in transit marks another turning point in the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States, and there are many ways to describe the situation at this tipping point.
Covid is widespread
While not common, Covid-19 is certainly common.
Over the past two years, official case counts suggest that nearly a quarter of the country has been infected with coronavirus, and the number of actual infections is estimated to be many times higher than reported.
Despite a drastic drop in cases over the past two months, more than 35,000 people in the US are infected daily, according to data from Johns Hopkins University — enough to fill Madison Square Garden nearly twice a day.
Northeastern states are seeing cases rise faster than others, leading what could become a broader national wave, as has the region over the past two springs.
This year, Covid-19 is also combatable.
Vaccines have proven to be remarkably effective. In February, fully vaccinated people were five times less likely to be hospitalized with Covid-19 and 10 times less likely to die, according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The risk was even lower for those who also received a booster dose.
Some treatments have also resisted Omicron, and the federal government is shipping hundreds of thousands of antivirals each week.
But Covid-19 is not normal
But Covid-19 is still not normal. Even as severe Covid-19 averages improve dramatically, they remain much worse than severe flu.
The 2017-2018 flu season was one of the worst in decades. An estimated 710,000 people were hospitalized and 52,000 died.
Daily Covid-19 deaths are at their lowest point in a year now — but even with a relatively low rate of 400 deaths a day, the virus still killed more people in two months than the flu in an entire year.
At the height of the Omicron outbreak just a few months ago, more people died from Covid-19 in just a few weeks than in an entire year from the flu.
Hospitalizations for Covid-19 recently hit the lowest point on record and new admissions last week were still three times higher than the latest weekly flu admissions, CDC data show.
And Covid-19 is still unpredictable.
Covid-19 has some similarities to the flu, but it’s not the same thing, said Arnold Monto, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan and acting chair of the Food and Drug Administration’s Advisory Committee on Vaccines and Related Biological Products. from the USA.
“We are in uncharted territory,” he said. “With the flu, we know very well what to expect, but with Covid we are learning every day.”
Two prepress articles published last year describe the seasonal patterns of the waves of the pandemic so far and suggest that these patterns could repeat in subsequent years.
These seasonal patterns can help leaders anticipate outbreaks and places like health facilities to prepare properly, but “they’re not always dominant,” said Donald Burke, an infectious disease specialist and former dean of the Graduate School of Public Health at University of Pittsburgh, co-author of the articles with Hawre Jalal. They have not yet been peer-reviewed.
“If something like a particularly transmissible strain comes into play — like Omicron — it can overwhelm and change patterns,” Burke said. “Omicron really stopped things.”
The future is still unclear
In December, Sen Pei, assistant professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, told CNN that we were still “a long way off” from an endemic stage of the pandemic.
The vast majority of the population would need to have immunity to the virus from infection or vaccination before it gets to that point, he said at the time.
The Omicron outbreak dramatically raised the level of immunity in the US population and brought us closer to that point, but the future of Covid-19 is still unclear.
“Long term, I think it largely depends on whether there will be new variants, which is highly unpredictable at this point,” he said Tuesday.
“It’s unclear what the endemic pattern will look like and whether we’ve entered that phase now.”
Following the White House’s reaction, Delta Air Lines adjusted its characterization of Covid-19, praising the decision on face masks in transportation, saying that Covid is in “transition to a more manageable respiratory virus”.
But the CDC still recommends wearing masks on planes.
Conflicting opinions about the next steps for the Covid-19 pandemic exist in the public health community and, at times, even within individuals themselves.
Monto says dropping the mask tenure now, in what he hopes will be the end of the BA.2 variant’s rise, “might not be too bad,” but it could also be “a few weeks too early because we’re not sure where to go.” we are going.”
In any case, continued vigilance remains critical.
“We have to be vigilant and respond to what is happening,” he said. “We’ve never seen a coronavirus pandemic before.”
*With information from Kevin Liptak and Jacqueline Howard of CNN
Source: CNN Brasil
