CDC Slashes Omicron Estimates: See Latest California Cases

LOS ANGELES, CA — The highly contagious omicron variant of the coronavirus has now officially overtaken the delta variant in California, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As of the week ending on Christmas, omicron cases in California represented 54.5 percent of cases; delta represented 45.2 percent of cases, according to the CDC.

The latest findings came as the Food and Drug Administration on Thursday signaled plans to allow booster shots for people as young as 12 years old. The FDA also moved to revise the recommendation for getting a booster shot to five months after becoming fully vaccinated instead of six months.

The CDC was expected to take up the issue next week. Booster shots were seen as key to protecting the nation during the omicron surge.

Federal health officials, however, walked back week-old estimates that the highly contagious omicron variant was responsible for nearly three out of four new coronavirus cases in parts of the United States.

The CDC reported on Dec. 18 that 73 percent of new cases were linked to omicron. This week, however, the agency revised those figures, slashing the earlier estimate to 23 percent — a drop of nearly 50 percentage points.

The drastic change suggested that while omicron cases are on the rise, the variant is not infecting people at the rate the CDC had projected.

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“There's no way around it, it is a huge swing that makes it seem like something went really wrong," Dr. Shruti Gohil, associate medical director at the University of California, Irvine's School of Medicine, told National Public Radio. "But there is always a delay in the testing information that comes in, and that's what the public should take away.”

The new data came a month after omicron was detected half a world away and days after Americans gathered for the holidays.

Despite this week’s revision, omicron cases increased nationwide. The variant accounted for nearly 59 percent of all new cases for the week ending on Christmas Day. The delta variant — the variant more likely to cause severe illness — still accounted for nearly 41 percent of new cases.

In some regions of the country, the spike in omicron cases was significantly higher than the national average. The variant accounted for more than 88 percent of new infections in the Northeast and nearly 87 percent in the Texas region.

The delta variant had been dominant since June and as recently as the end of November represented 99.5 percent of new cases.

Only about 33 percent of Americans have received COVID-19 booster shots, which health officials said is the best defense against the omicron variant. About 62 percent of Americans were fully vaccinated but weren’t boosted, and health officials worried about the nation’s ability to withstand a fifth wave of COVID-19.

For more information, go to the CDC data tracker.

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