Philly On Average Has Record COVID-19 Cases, But Officials Hope This Wave Will Have Fewer Hospitalizations | national

PHILADELPHIA – The seven-day average of new coronavirus cases in Philadelphia is the highest it has ever been, as the delta variant and the highly transmissible omicron variant have spread in the region.

The city had an average of 1,407 new cases per day Monday, surpassing the previous high of 1,235 set on December 8, 2020. The number has increased in recent weeks, multiplying by five since November 30.

“The concern is great,” said Patrick Kelly, an intensive care unit nurse at Einstein Medical Center, which is already nearing capacity with sick patients. “More people are in contact with positive people. It’s the same with everyone you talk to.

City officials say they believe cases will continue to rise in the days and weeks to come. Most of these new cases were reported in the days leading up to Christmas, when scores of people attended rallies.

“Places like the UK and Denmark are still seeing the number of cases increase rapidly,” said James Garrow, spokesperson for the Department of Public Health in Philadelphia. “They started this climb before us, so we think there’s still some time to go until we reach that peak.”

A vaccination mandate will go into effect in Philadelphia on Jan. 3 for all businesses that serve food, but no additional restrictions are currently planned, Garrow said.

Since hospital influxes are typically several weeks behind the case influx, several experts and officials said they wouldn’t know until mid-January if hospitals here are overwhelmed.

“We don’t yet know when hospitals will reach a critical level, but given that the number of people hospitalized for COVID has doubled in three weeks,” Garrow said, “we are very concerned about our hospitals. “

While early research indicates that omicron may be less likely to send people to hospital, especially if they are vaccinated and boosted, the speed at which the variant spreads could still overwhelm providers, even if a smaller percentage of infected people get very sick.

Emergency services are already taxed, with waits ranging from four to six hours in city hospitals. If cases continue to increase, hospitals may need to reinstate emergency measures taken in previous outbreaks, including the cancellation of some elective procedures and the conversion of other services to intensive care units.

“We really don’t want to go there like we used to,” said Rohit Gulati, chief medical officer of Einstein Health System. “But if it got to that, that’s what we would have to do.”

Einstein, the most stressed hospital in town, has around 100 confirmed or suspected COVID-19 hospital patients, he said. This represents about a third of the total capacity of beds staffed at the hospital. Overall, the hospital’s medical units are almost 100 percent of their capacity, Gulati said.

Doctors noted, however, that this surge is already proving to be much less deadly than previous ones. Einstein’s intensive care unit now has up to 10 COVID-19 patients at a time, Gulati said, up from 50 or 60 a year ago. Hospitals now also have treatment, including antiviral pills from Merck and Pfizer.

“We have a few more tools and we’ve learned a bit more from previous experience on how to handle it,” Gulati said. “It’s just a matter of what percentage of the population get sick.”

The latest wave of cases comes as omicron spreads faster than previous variants – and escapes some vaccine protection – and more people are being tested for the virus.

More than 39,000 Philadelphians were tested at city sites from Dec. 20-22, taking into account advice from health officials, including Philadelphia Health Commissioner Cheryl Bettigole, who urged testing before seeing the family or friends for vacation. Many others have had rapid home tests, which are not counted in official records.

However, more tests alone do not explain the jump in positive cases. In the seven days ending Dec. 26, more than a quarter of COVID-19 tests in the city came back positive, up from 5% on Thanksgiving week.

Distressing records are also being set in the suburbs, with the seven-day average of new cases per 100,000 people reaching pandemic highs in suburbs of Pennsylvania and southern Jersey. The average in southern Jersey is highest, at 110.8 cases per capita.

Hospitalizations have increased 60% in New Jersey over the past two weeks, according to the New York Times, and have remained relatively stable in Pennsylvania over the same period. However, Pennsylvania has the third highest daily average of COVID-19 hospital patients in the country.

The surge in cases comes as hospitals grapple with staff shortages and continue to care for non-COVID-19 patients.

“We have cases that are increasing. We are seeing the flu return, “said John Goldman, infectious disease specialist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center,” and we are seeing people returning to hospital after delaying care and they end up being. sicker than they would be. “

In central and western Pennsylvania, several hospitals were at or near capacity by Christmas.

The Lehigh Valley Health Network was treating 330 COVID-19 patients at its five hospitals on Tuesday, a spokesperson said; only 3% of them were fully vaccinated and boosted, none of them needing intensive care.

“We know there is a solution and it’s just not being used,” said Nichole Persing, director of nursing for patient care services who manages a COVID-19 unit on the Cedar Crest campus. system in Allentown. “It doesn’t have to be like that.”

Locally, part of the burden on hospitals could be avoided. People who don’t have severe symptoms of COVID-19 go to the emergency room unnecessarily, Gulati said.

“We ask most individuals not to come, especially if they have mild symptoms,” he said.

Those vaccinated and boosted are particularly protected against serious infections, according to medical experts. It could help Philadelphia and its collar counties, which are more vaccinated than most of the rest of the state and where a higher percentage of hospital beds remain available than in the Commonwealth as a whole.

“We’re not where we were last year,” said Lisa O’Mahony, Delaware County medical advisor.

Outside of Philadelphia, 59% of all residents of Pennsylvania are fully immunized with two doses of Pfizer or Moderna or one dose of Johnson & Johnson. Locally, however, about 62% of Philadelphians are fully immune and about 70% are in each of the col counties.

About 30% of fully vaccinated Pennsylvanians outside of Philadelphia have received a booster, according to state data, as have about 40% of New Jerseyans, Gov. Phil Murphy said last week.

Jennifer Horney, founding director of the University of Delaware’s epidemiology program, said we likely won’t know the impact of omicron on death rates until the end of January, but she is optimistic based on the analyzes. preliminary of the behavior of the variant in South Africa.

“Although we have a lot of people in the hospital, most of those vaccinated don’t get seriously ill with omicron,” said Horney. “If this continues, I hope our next few weeks won’t be so bad.”

Public health experts emphasize that vaccination is the most effective tool to prevent hospitalizations and deaths.

“Just because we’re seeing a lot of mild cases with omicron doesn’t mean people shouldn’t consider getting the vaccine and boosting as soon as they’re eligible,” Horney said.

The nearly 126 million unvaccinated Americans are at particularly high risk. It would only take serious infections in a small percentage of that population to flood hospitals, Gulati said.

And as community spread intensifies, the safety of those most at risk of serious COVID-19 infections, including the elderly and immunocompromised, is not guaranteed, even with vaccination.

“The cases, the last couple that came in, they actually had their boosters,” said Kelly, Einstein’s nurse. “They have comorbidities and all that, but it’s always worrying, even with the boosters, they get sick.”

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