CT COVID-19 Hospitalizations Jump To Highest Level Since February

CONNECTICUT — The number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 reached its highest level since mid-February on Thursday, according to the state Department of Public Health.

DPH reported that 400 patients were hospitalized with the virus Thursday, which was 75 more than seven days ago and the most since Feb. 14.

Connecticut reported about 3,900 COVID-19 cases over seven days on Thursday; The weekly positive test rate was 9.89 percent. The number of weekly cases has hovered between 3,000 and 4,000 for several weeks. There were 14 weekly COVID-19-related deaths reported as well, bringing the state total up to 11,343.

The “end is in sight” for the pandemic, the World Health Organization said this week, but there are still precautions Connecticut residents should take to live with COVID-19, according to health officials.

Nationally, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data shows new U.S. cases and hospitalizations are trending downward. Still, the number of deaths — an average of 356 a day, according to the CDC’s seven-day rolling average, are far above the average of 168 daily deaths for the week ending July 6, 2022. Just three months ago, the average was 258 daily deaths.

“We have never been in a better position to end the pandemic,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a briefing Wednesday after COVID-19 deaths reached their lowest level — 11,000 for the week of Sept. 5-11 — since the pandemic began.

“We are not there yet, but the end is in sight,” he said, warning that “now is the worst time to stop running” in the race against the virus.

President Joe Biden declared that the pandemic was over, but said there is still work to do.

“The pandemic is over,” Biden said during a 60 Minutes interview. “We still have a problem with COVID. We're still doing a lotta work on it. It's-- but the pandemic is over. If you notice, no one's wearing masks. Everybody seems to be in pretty good shape. And so I think it's changing. And I think this is a perfect example of it."

Some public health experts panned Biden's comment and said it will make it more difficult to convince people to get Omicron-specific booster shots, according to NPR. White House officials haven't been able to convince Congress to provide another $22 billion for the continuing battle against the virus.

The United States is seeing “an important shift in our fight against the virus,” White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha said at a briefing earlier this month.

That’s if the virus doesn’t mutate again, making a new omicron-specific booster shot less effective.

“In the absence of dramatically different variants, we likely are moving towards a path with a vaccination cadence similar to that of the annual influenza vaccine, with annual updated COVID-19 shots matched to the currently circulating strains for most of the population,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy of Infectious Diseases, said at the briefing.

Health officials recommend the new booster shot for all Americans, but especially for people 50 and older and people with underlying health issues.

Just over 79 percent of the U.S. population has received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine, but the number of people who are fully vaccinated with one booster shot drops off significantly, standing at 48 percent.

In Connecticut, about 54 percent of people are fully vaccinated with at least one booster dose, according to the CDC.

People with at least one dose by age group, according to the state Department of Public Health:

• >95% of those 65+
• >95% of those between 55-64
• 92% of those between 45-54
• 91% of those between 35-44
• 88% of those between 25-34
• 85% of those between 15-24
• 73% of those between 10-14
• 50% of those between 5-9
• 10% of those between 0-4