Vaccine Resistant COVID Strains Could Fuel Fall Surge In PA

PENNSYLVANIA — Vaccine efforts are ramping up in Pennsylvania as autumn starts and the region hopes to brace itself against another fall surge of COVID-19, which officials warn could hit as it has for the past two years.

It could be driven by a new variant of concern, XBB, that officials say appears resistant to vaccines.

But cases remain low around the state for now, despite the colder weather and trends from the recent past.

The state now has just three counties in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's "high" level of transmission, in which masks are recommended in indoor, public places. That's down from 14 just over a month ago, and down from 6 just over two weeks ago.

The CDC adopted the community-level metric — a metric based on hospitalizations and case rates — in late February. The agency updates its color-coded COVID maps each Thursday, recommending masks in counties with "high" community levels.

New variant emerging

Just in time for the fall season, a new variant called XBB, combining the omicron variant and other strains of coronavirus, has emerged. It was first detected in the United States in August but has not yet been confirmed in Pennsylvania, according to the CDC.

It has already driven up cases in other countries around the world, including Singapore and Bangladesh, Bloomberg reports.

Experts say it is "immune evasive," Fortune reports, although it is not yet clear how effective the new bivalent booster will be in stopping it.

It's one of several variants that federal officials are tracking. White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Ashish Jha said the extent of a future surge in the United States will heavily depend on vaccination rates and the precautions people take.

"There are at least three subvariants that we're tracking very, very closely, all of which appear to have a lot more immune escape," Jha told NPR. "Now, the good news about them is while they seem to do a better job of escaping immunity, they are derived from BA.5 or BA.2, its closely related cousin, and the new vaccines we have, which protect you against BA.5, should really continue to work really quite well against these new variants."

Latest coronavirus numbers for the state

Cooler weather has been here for weeks now, but most metrics are continuing to trend downward statewide, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health's Early Warning Monitoring Dashboard. Statistics from the most recent seven day period monitored are below:

• Overall cases dropped from 9,994 to 9,370
• Positivity rate dropped from 12.4 percent to 11.7 percent
• Incidence rate dropped from 78.1 to 73.2
• Average daily hospitalizations increased from 1,170 to 1,177
• Average daily number of patients on ventilators decreased from 60 to 54
• Hospital emergency room visits increased from 1.1 percent to 1.4 percent

State refocusing efforts on vaccination

Federal officials also granted approval this week for children to use the new bivalent COVID-19 booster shots. The booster protects against both the original coronavirus and Omicron variants BA.4 and BA.5. Shots are in the hands of providers state wide.

Acting Health Secretary and Pennsylvania Physician General Dr. Denise Johnson said that with activities shifting indoors, there's even greater risk from potential infection.

“The updated COVID-19 booster shots restore protection that may have waned since previous vaccinations and provide added protection against the Omicron variant, including the highly transmissible BA.4 and BA.5 strains, which account for the vast majority of COVID-19 infections in the United States,” Johnson said.

Children must wait two weeks after the complete their primary series to get the booster shot.

The state is working with counties to help host free vaccine clinics and launch campaigns for vaccine awareness, for both coronavirus and the flu.

"This flu season has the potential to be severe, so we are encouraging Pennsylvanians to get their flu shot and COVID-19 booster together to keep our communities safe," Johnson added. "Influenza is serious and can be deadly, which is why it is important that Pennsylvanians receive their flu vaccine."