Here are the latest national Covid-19 trends, according to the CDC and major wastewater surveillance providers:
- New hospital admissions with Covid-19 have decreased 10%, from 2,800 admissions per day during the week ending February 17 to 2,500 admissions per day during the week ending February 24.
- Test positivity has decreased 11%, from 8.3% of Covid-19 tests returning positive results during the week ending February 17 to 7.4% of tests during the week ending February 24.
- Healthcare visits for influenza-like illness have decreased 0.5% between the week ending February 17 and the week ending February 24.
- SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater has decreased 5% between the week ending February 17 and the week ending February 24, and the national wastewater viral activity level is high, per the CDC.
- SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater has decreased 12% between February 24 and March 2, per Biobot Analytics.
- SARS-CoV-2 concentration in wastewater has decreased 14% between February 19 and February 26, per WastewaterSCAN.
After a February of plateaus in Covid-19 spread, all major metrics are now pointing once again to a decline in transmission. A lower-risk spring is on the horizon in the coming weeks. Right now, though, viral levels remain high across the U.S., and the CDC’s recent change to its isolation guidance won’t help.
Wastewater surveillance data from the CDC, Biobot Analytics, and WastewaterSCAN all point to declining — but still high — SARS-CoV-2 transmission at the national level. Viral levels right now are similar to the levels reported in late November, around Thanksgiving, and are a bit higher than this time last year but trending in a similar direction (i.e. down, but going slowly).
As we’ve seen over the last few weeks, the South and Midwest continue to report higher SARS-CoV-2 levels in wastewater than the Northeast and West Coast. Per the CDC, Southeast states including Delaware, Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, and South Carolina are reporting very high viral levels.
Covid-19 hospitalizations and test positivity are also going down, though slowly. New hospital admissions fell by just 26% from late January to late February, and about 2,500 patients were admitted every day during the week ending February 24, as tallied by the CDC. In better news, test positivity from the CDC’s respiratory lab network has been below 10% (a common threshold for high transmission) for three weeks now.
Respiratory viruses, namely flu and RSV, are still spreading at high levels, too. The CDC’s flu surveillance reports that doctors visits for influenza-like illness (ILI) have been steady for about a month, likely driven by behavior as well as changes in which influenza variants are circulating. South and Midwest states report very high ILI levels, similar to the Covid-19 patterns.
In its recently-updated guidance, the CDC has equated Covid-19 with the flu and RSV. While these viruses all infect people through the respiratory system, extensive research shows that Covid-19 can be far more damaging long-term to all parts of the body. As journalist Melody Schreiber recently wrote in a critique of the new guidance at The New Republic, respiratory symptoms are not actually a great predictor of when someone is contagious with Covid-19. “The consequences both for contagion and public trust… could be severe,” Schreiber wrote.
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