SAN CARLOS, CA – DECEMBER 31: Children reach for balloons during the New Year’s Eve Balloon Drop at 12:00 PM at the Hiller Air Museum on Friday, December 31, 2021 in San Carlos, California. (Shay Hammond/Bay Area News Group)
As the countdown to 2024 approaches, Dwayne Taylor, founder of San Jose event company Taylor Productions, is preparing to celebrate. He has been hosting the city’s largest New Year’s party for nearly a decade. And for the first time since 2020, COVID-19 finally feels like it’s no longer an obstacle.
“I’ve been through it three times, and I’ve had a lot of really close friends die from coronavirus,” said Taylor, who canceled parties in 2020 and 2021 but restarted them last year. “So if I had thought for a second that this party was going to be a problem or a viral event, I would have canceled it immediately.”
Even though COVID-19 is still present and continues to spread, hospitalizations are rising, and the presence of the virus in wastewater is also increasing, Taylor said the same thing happened. He’s one of many Bay Area residents doing the math.
Most people are throwing masks and other precautions to the wind, but it’s not just revelers. Nearly four years into the pandemic, state- and county-level health alerts have become less frequent and more subdued than in previous years, mostly to get people vaccinated and if they get sick. urges people to stay at home.
“We’re having a hard time communicating to the public that there are a lot of viruses out there and that they’re likely to get sick if they don’t take precautions…But at the same time, things are getting a lot better. ” said John Swartzberg, clinical professor emeritus of infectious diseases and vaccinology at the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health.
Across the Bay Area, areas such as San Leandro, Central Contra Costa, Oakland, San Francisco and Redwood City have “high levels” in sewage, according to the WastewasterSCAN dashboard, a national dataset based at Stanford University. It is said that the new coronavirus infection has been observed. .
San Jose has experienced a particularly dramatic surge, with wastewater data showing COVID-19 infections at levels only seen during the two worst waves of the pandemic. Concentration levels are higher than during the first winter wave in January 2021, when hospitals suspended non-emergency surgeries and procedures to prevent continued spread.
So why aren’t people worried? Unlike earlier in the pandemic, when infection with the new coronavirus was deadly for the elderly and immunocompromised and dangerous for everyone else, new infections can lead to hospitalization and death. There aren’t that many. Symptoms are usually milder thanks to readily available vaccines, and treatments such as paxrobid can reduce the severity of symptoms.
Still, the number of hospitalizations this year is by no means small, and is far higher than the number of patients rushed to the hospital due to influenza.
Despite the reduced risk, the coronavirus remains deadly, killing more than 1,000 people in California since October 1. From Dec. 10 to Dec. 16, 2,800 people were hospitalized with the coronavirus and just over 1,000 with the flu across the state.
Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease physician at the University of California, San Francisco, said Wednesday that the hospital had 27 coronavirus patients, two of whom were in intensive care. That’s compared to 15 cases two weeks ago. He said most of those hospitalized are over 75 years old and have not been vaccinated.
“(The new variant) is easier to catch because it’s more transmissible. That’s why it seems like everyone and their neighbors are infected with the coronavirus now,” Chin-Hong said.
Hospitalizations are rising across the state and nationally, but are nowhere near the heights of the early virus surge. The number of hospitalized patients with the new coronavirus peaked at 146,000 in late January 2022, but had declined to just 20,000 by mid-December 2023. California currently has about 1,900 people hospitalized, a fraction of the more than 22,000 people hospitalized at the state’s peak in January 2021.
There is also a risk of contracting other respiratory viruses, such as respiratory syncytial virus or influenza, Chin-Hong said.
Still, for some New Year’s Eve celebrants, especially those who are younger and healthier, dealing with COVID-19 seems to have faded into the background of daily life.
“Some people still wear masks at some events, but it’s the same as a few years ago,” said Tony Orella, general manager of Roccapulco, which is planning a 600-person New Year’s Eve celebration at the San Francisco club this year. That’s not the situation,” he said. Sunday. “The number of infections is on the rise again, but this is just a season.”
Like the few people still wearing masks at Orella’s party, many Bay Area residents are still looking for ways to reduce their risk of getting sick even as they venture out. Schwartzberg has this advice for such people: “If you’re throwing a party, part of your invitations should include the following: “If you have any symptoms, please do not come.”
Schwartzberg said he understands that most people don’t want to wear a mask at a party, but “if possible, keep windows open and ensure ventilation.” And use these air filters even outside of fire season. Chin-Hong also said anyone who has not received a booster shot this fall, or who has been directly exposed to the coronavirus, should receive the latest vaccination as soon as possible.
“There’s a one-two-three punch of Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s, and people are coming together and there’s a lot of stuff flying around,” Chin-Hong said. “(Interest rates) are likely to rise again after the new year.”
What’s more, it’s not just acute illness that you should worry about, Schwartzberg said. For some people, the prolonged effects of infection can be debilitating.
“Make sure you factor in the long-term COVID issue,” he said.
