A Louisiana health expert warns of a surge in COVID and says it’s time to prepare for Omicron.coronavirus

A year after Louisiana began deploying the coronavirus vaccine, which many wanted to put an end to the pandemic, Omicron variants raised new concerns among local medical professionals. rice field.

Omicron cases have been detected in several parts of the state, including New Orleans and the University of Tulane, and school officials have revived mask obligations and optional remote classes.

Cases of COVID in Louisiana are starting to rise, albeit very few compared to the recent pandemic wave. And as scientists around the world work to determine the severity of Omicron variants, public health experts say that after the pandemic, before the pandemic spreads wildly and refills regional hospitals. It’s time to prepare for what could be a wave of.

“We have the ability to slow down this upheaval,” said Dr. Lucio Mille, director of the LSU Health New Orleans Precision Medicine Institute. “It’s a matter of choice for each of us.”

Miele said she wasn’t surprised to find cases 2 and 3 of Omicron in his lab last week. He is more looking forward to the sampling results coming out on Wednesday, and has already vaccinated people, got booster shots, put on masks in crowded areas, and increased testing and social distance. Encourage.

Researchers say that Omicron is highly infectious, and while vaccines reduce the severity of the virus, it is clear that it is not very effective in preventing infection. Outbreak studies in South Africa and the United Kingdom, where variants are rapidly prevalent, have not yet confirmed whether it leads to milder cases overall.

Highly mutated variants received international attention around Thanksgiving when South African researchers reported a rapidly increasing number of cases. The UK, which has one of the world’s most thorough surveillance programs, reports that cases have more than doubled every three days in recent weeks.

Dr. Julio Figueroa, Head of Infectious Diseases at LSU Health New Orleans, said, “We are still looking into more about what we expect,” but the study is already more contagious than Delta. Is shown. Cases and hospitalization in Louisiana this summer.

The new variant accounted for approximately 3% of Covid-19 cases sequenced in the United States during the week leading up to December 11, an increase from 0.4% in the previous week. During the briefing on Tuesday, federal health officials predicted a surge in January. This will again undermine the hospital’s ability to care for both COVID and non-COVID patients.

In a state like Louisiana where 50% of the population is fully vaccinated, what is most worrisome is that previous infections, the so-called “innate immunity,” are less effective than the 61% nationwide. It doesn’t seem to be the target. Against Omicron.

Susan Hasig, an epidemiologist at Tulane University, said:

Louisiana also tends to have a more sick population, with many people suffering from obesity, diabetes and heart disease. All of this puts people at risk of serious consequences.

However, with both Omicron and Delta occurring abroad, the current number of cases is so small that Louisiana may be in a better position to stop the next surge.

As of Tuesday, the Louisiana Department of Health reported that 198 people were hospitalized for COVID, well below the mid-August delta surge of 3,022, centered on the lowest level since the pandemic began. did. In the last seven days, the state has reported 2,382 new infections, an increase of 40% from last month, well below the delta wave height of about 30,000 per week.

“We are in a slightly better position in the south in some respects,” said Hasig, noting that the northeastern and midwestern states may soon deal with both delta and omicron outbreaks. “There is a little more freeboard.”

It is unclear what percentage of COVID cases Omicron currently accounts for in Louisiana, with 45 confirmed cases since December 3.

Meanwhile, there were some signs of hope around their effectiveness against boosters and new variants. Pfizer said the third injection of the vaccine increased antibody protection against Omicron by a factor of 25 compared to the second injection.

According to a study published from South Africa on Tuesday, Omicron reduced the infection-preventing capacity of the double-dose Pfizer vaccine from 80% to 33% for Delta Air Lines, but with less concern about its impact on hospitalization, 93%. It dropped from to 70%.

But death and hospitalization are not the only bad consequences. According to a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 1 in 3 people infected with COVID have long-term health problems.

“It’s not just about catching COVID and dying or not,” Miele said. “It’s about the risk of long COVID.”

Hasig pointed out that mask instructions and other steps to slow the spread of the virus are always behind the punch because the case is already steep.

She said it was time to revive Maskman Date.

Officials in New York and California said the states will enforce their state-wide indoor mask obligations this week.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.