National Covid-19 trends, December 19

Here are the latest national Covid-19 trends, according to the CDC and major wastewater surveillance providers:

• New hospital admissions with Covid-19 have increased 3%, from 3,200 admissions per day during the week ending December 2 to 3,300 admissions per day during the week ending December 9.
• Test positivity has decreased 3%, from 11.4% of Covid-19 tests returning positive results during the week ending December 2 to 11.0% of positive tests during the week ending December 9.
• Healthcare visits for influenza-like illness have increased 9% between the week ending December 2 and the week ending December 9.
• SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater has increased 6% between the week ending December 2 and the week ending December 9, and the national wastewater viral activity level is very high, per the CDC.
• SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater has increased 10% between December 6 and December 13, per Biobot Analytics.
• SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater has increased 9% between December 6 and December 13, per WastewaterSCAN.

Covid-19 spread continues to increase across the country — along with the spread of other respiratory viruses — as the U.S. heads into our busiest period of travel and holiday gatherings. Despite this winter following the same disease trends as we saw the last three years, public health institutions have failed to prepare any better; in fact, vaccination rates are so low, the CDC issued an “urgent health advisory” to doctors.

Wastewater surveillance data from the CDC, Biobot Analytics, and WastewaterSCAN all indicate high and increasing coronavirus infections nationally. The CDC now rates the national wastewater viral activity level for Covid-19 as “very high,” up from “high” last week. While the rate of increased viral activity has slowed down somewhat from earlier in December, gatherings next week, combined with the rising JN.1 variant, will likely contribute to more disease spread.

According to Biobot’s data, the U.S. is currently reporting similar levels of viral activity to those tracked during this time in December 2020. That December, public health agencies counted over 200,000 Covid-19 cases per day, according to the Covid Tracking Project — and it was much easier to get a PCR test then than it is now. So, it’s reasonable to estimate that the U.S. is currently seeing hundreds of thousands of cases per day, potentially adding up to over one million per week.

For regional trends: the Northeast and Midwest continue to have significantly higher coronavirus levels in wastewater than the Midwest and South. Levels are going up sharply in the Northeast and may be declining slightly in the Midwest, according to recent weeks of data from the three national wastewater dashboards; these trends could change as the holiday season goes on. Upper Midwest states such as Nebraska, Montana, Iowa, and Michigan have “very high” wastewater viral activity levels, per the CDC.

Flu and RSV cases also continue to be high and increasing across the country. Several states in the South and on the West Coast (Alabama, Mississippi, Colorado, California, Nevada) continue to have high levels of influenza-like activity, per the CDC, as do New York City and New Jersey. The CDC warned last week that the combined spread of Covid-19, flu, and RSV could lead to overwhelmed hospitals.

In response to the rising disease levels, the CDC issued a health advisory calling on doctors to help get more people vaccinated for all three viruses. As of December 9, about 42% of U.S. adults have received this year’s flu shot — and just 18% have received this year’s Covid-19 shot, per CDC estimates. These vaccination levels aren’t high enough to prevent strain on the healthcare system; yet it’s not surprising that the majority of Americans haven’t received the latest Covid-19 shot, considering how few resources went into making the shot widely accessible as vaccines are now covered by private insurance.