LA County seeing slight increase in COVID cases, officials warn of possible winter surge

LOS ANGELES - Exactly two weeks after the Thanksgiving holiday and its associated gatherings of family and friends, Los Angeles County is seeing an increase in COVID-19 cases, the public health director Barbara Ferrer said recently, calling the trend a possible start of yet another winter surge of infections.

Dr. Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, said she is not surprised to see an increase in COVID-19 cases.

"We had the busiest traveling period that we've had to date since the beginning of the pandemic [with Thanksgiving]. People have been excited to get together with their loved ones, but it doesn't come without risk. We still are in the middle of the pandemic. We have a highly contagious variant that is currently circulating, the delta variant, and we are seeing waning immunity," said Rimoin. 

In an online briefing, Ferrer said Thursday the increase was visible by Dec. 1, when the county's seven-day average daily number of new cases topped 1,000 -- a 19% increase from the previous week. She also noted a resulting increase in hospitalizations, with the daily number of COVID patients nearing roughly 600.

"We do expect increases to continue on the heels of our Thanksgiving gatherings, but already, based on trends, we are looking at possible beginnings of a winter surge," Ferrer said.

She said the county's current average daily rate of new infections has risen to 13 per 100,000 residents, up from 8 per 100,000 residents a week ago. The seven-day cumulative rate of infections rose to 113 per 100,000, moving the county back into the category of "high" transmission as defined by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The county was previously in the less-severe "substantial" transmission category. That category requires a county to have a cumulative seven-day transmission rate of less than 100 cases per 100,000 residents.

Rimoin also pointed to vaccination numbers as a potential cause for concern in the U.S.  

"While we've done really well getting 60% of the U.S population vaccinated, we still have 40% of the population unvaccinated. Vaccination is the number one thing we can do to prevent getting COVID-19, becoming severely ill, getting hospitalized or dying but also to prevent long COVID," said Rimoin. 

Ferrer said the county's case increase was also reflected in schools.

"In the week following the Thanksgiving break, cases among students in particular rose to their highest level since late September," Ferrer said. "If, as we suspect, this increase in cases reflects transmission that took place during holiday gatherings, we should consider this an early warning about the upcoming December holiday."

Rimoin said there are ways to reduce chances of transmission at holiday gatherings by ensuring people who are attending gatherings are vaccinated and also wearing masks at gatherings or having some activities outdoors.

"Asking everybody to be vaccinated that is attending a party is one thing you can do. But not everybody is eligible for vaccination, not everybody is fully vaccinated, and the reality of it is everybody is likely to know somebody or potentially have a family member who may not be vaccinated, and you have to decide your level of risk. You can require testing prior to getting together. Rapid tests are fairly fast and they can be pretty accurate in terms of reducing the probability of someone being infectious when they show up," she said.
 

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Rimoin said delta is still the dominant variant of concern. 

"A lot of people are becoming very concerned about omicron, and it's true, we do need to be worried about omicron because it's extremely contagious. But we are facing a surge with delta right now, and we know exactly what to expect with delta at this point. It's very contagious," said Rimoin. 

Rimoin said it's important to get vaccinated or boosted to best curb a potential surge. 

"We have a lot of virus circulating. There's still a lot of people at risk. A lot of people are dying unnecessarily so anything we can do and using all the weapons in our arsenal to fight this war against COVID is the right thing," Rimoin said. 

The county reported another 15 COVID-19 deaths on Thursday, raising the death toll to 27,288.

Another 1,718 new infections were also reported, giving the county a pandemic total of 1,541,886.

According to state figures, there were 667 COVID-19-positive patients in Los Angeles County hospitals as of Thursday, the same as Wednesday. The number of those patients being treated in intensive care was 158, up from 151 a day earlier.

The rolling average daily rate of people testing positive for the virus was 1.4% as of Thursday.

According to the most recent figures, 83% of county residents aged 12 and over have received at least one dose of vaccine, and 75% are fully vaccinated. Of all eligible residents aged 5 and over, 77% have received at least one dose, and 69% are fully vaccinated.

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Of the more than 6.15 million fully vaccinated people in the county, 84,931 have tested positive, or about 1.38%. A total of 2,798 vaccinated people have been hospitalized, for a rate of 0.046%, and 537 have died, for a rate of 0.009%.

While the county Department of Public Health has identified a total of four cases of the new Omicron variant of COVID-19 -- and Long Beach has confirmed one additional case -- Ferrer said the Delta variant remains the dominant strain of the virus in the county, accounting for more than 99% of cases that undergo genetic sequencing.

Ferrer said the county is now conducting sequencing of 25% of all positive cases to identify COVID variants.

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