WA fifth COVID-19 wave could plateau soon, but holiday weekend might threaten progress
During the same news conference Thursday to reassure parents of the school year’s start amid the pandemic, state health officials made clear the state’s fifth wave of COVID-19 isn’t over.
Dr. Scott Lindquist, the state’s acting health officer, addressed the state Department of Health’s hospitalizations modeling for the next few weeks.
“I have seen that preliminary data and it does not look good,” Lindquist said. “Our best hope is that we have a downturn in cases but again, like we keep saying, vaccinating and preventing ongoing cases is our best chance at protecting the hospitals. But our modeling does not look promising.”
Lindquist did say cases statewide appeared to be starting to plateau, based on incomplete data from the most recent days.
“The concern though is this plateau in cases usually precedes the hospitalization plateau by one to two weeks,” he said. “So that means we’ve got at least, at best case scenario, one to two weeks of increased hospitalizations, and that’s exactly what we’re seeing,” he said.
“We’re seeing hospitalization rates at numbers we have never seen before,” he added, saying they are driven by the Delta variant and unvaccinated people.
State health officials said they were not inclined to impose more restrictions but were continuing to monitor the numbers.
“If the situation warrants that we have to take additional steps, we’re prepared to do that,” said Dr. Umair Shah, state Secretary of Health. “But obviously we also recognize that we want to keep our economy open; we want businesses to be able to do what they can.
“We do think that there’s going to be a point, and we’re already there, where you can do both, where you can stay open, but you also can have an eye towards health and protection. So we’re going to have to be living with this virus for a long time.”
Despite the seemingly endless tally of new cases, Lindquist said the state is nowhere near a herd-immunity scenario.
“I’m not a big fan of the words ‘herd immunity,’” Lindquist said. “What we’re really talking about is getting enough antibody protection in the community to prevent the transmission of this virus. This virus is 40% more infectious, so we actually have to drive those numbers higher. So no, we are not near that yet, as evidenced by the fifth wave.”
Michele Roberts, acting assistant secretary for DOH, said the latest estimate of overall community immunity statewide based on DOH modeling is at about 55 percent for both vaccination and disease exposure.
Lindquist noted that at this point more than 90 percent of all cases in the state now are the Delta variant, which is affecting all ages.
Add to that the strain already on hospitals heading into the Labor Day weekend and the start of the Washington State Fair, Lindquist echoed the pleas of state hospital leaders first issued last month to reduce any chances of landing yourself in the hospital.
“Please mitigate your risk this weekend,” Lindquist said, “so that you’re not put in a place where you need to try and access an already to capacity health care system. So, that means for me, I’m not going to go away for the weekend, I am not going to go water skiing. I can’t water ski anyway, but I’m not going to do things that are risky behaviors, because the backup for that safety net is so strained right now.”
This story was originally published September 2, 2021 at 1:20 PM with the headline "WA fifth COVID-19 wave could plateau soon, but holiday weekend might threaten progress."
