Several key COVID-19 trends that authorities track are now accelerating around the country, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Friday. It’s the first major nationwide uptick in the spread of the virus seen in months.

The largest increases are in the Midwest and the Mid-Atlantic, the agency said in its weekly report updated Friday, though virtually all regions of the country are now seeing accelerations.

Data reported by the agency from emergency rooms and wastewater sampling have tracked some of the steepest increases so far this season in the region spanning Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin.

Rates of infections of nursing home residents across this Midwestern region have also soared in recent weeks, higher than in most other parts of the country, approaching levels not seen since the peak of last winter’s COVID-19 wave.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      257 months ago

      And no one got the new boosters.

      Immunity drops off fast, and you need regular boosters, it’s just a fact.

      • @[email protected]
        cake
        link
        fedilink
        47 months ago

        My boss got the new booster and still got COVID over Thanksgiving. She likes to work while she’s sick (usually from home) and it still knocked her on her butt to the point where she actually only worked a few minutes each day.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          167 months ago

          It likely still helped to a degree. Meaning it may have been even worse had she not gotten the booster.

          • @[email protected]
            cake
            link
            fedilink
            47 months ago

            I’m sure it did help some. She is not as careful as she should be, probably, but at least she stays current on her vaccines (and masks up on planes).

  • @pan_troglodytes
    link
    English
    317 months ago

    it’s the new flu. the old flu is still a thing, of course. covid is here to stay & it’ll be a yearly thing for a long time to come.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      4
      edit-2
      7 months ago

      I agree. It killed most of those who were most susceptible already. We’ll adapt, as a species, to it over time.

      • @MagicShel
        link
        187 months ago

        I’m not sure we will adapt. Killing off the elderly and infirm isn’t exactly applying a lot of evolutionary pressure.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          -1
          edit-2
          7 months ago

          When you get resistant for it as young and healthy, it won’t be as dangerous when you get it again as older. It is good for the virus to spread as much as possible and not be leathal.

          • @MagicShel
            link
            37 months ago

            Immunity doesn’t last though. If it was like chicken pox I think this argument would have merit, but it’s more like the flu.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              4
              edit-2
              7 months ago

              To drive home your point even more, unfortunately chicken pox immunity doesn’t really last forever. It’s a herpes virus, a DNA virus, that integrates into cell genomes. It especially likes neurons, cells which you keep your whole life. Since it’s there for the rest of your life, it reactivates at inconvenient times. Shingles is probably the most benign form of reactivation, but it can cause meningitis, encephalitis, vasculitis too, among other things, all of which is very bad news for your brain. So for all the people out there with children, get that chicken pox vaccine. You don’t want that potential ticking time bomb living in your kid when there’s a way to prevent it.

              And for all the older people out there, get that shingles vaccine when you can. It’s not perfect but it’ll help “remind” the immune system to keep varicella virus in you surpressed.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              17 months ago

              Resistance is different than immunity, you will get sick, but it won’t be as leathal. It is exactly like flu. Flu has been here for centuries, and when Europeans brought it to America, it was huge issue for native American without resistance.

              • @MagicShel
                link
                27 months ago

                We have boosters because the resistance doesn’t stay or can’t keep up with the mutations.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        14
        edit-2
        7 months ago

        Flu is a dangerous virus, I wouldn’t say we’ve “adapted to it.” Viruses evolve much quicker than humans. They go through countless generations in the time we have one. Flu in addition has an interesting genetic mechanism for change most other viruses don’t have, where it can exchange entire large sections of its genome at once with other distinct flu viruses, very quickly creating an entirely new strain. This is one of the reasons we’re constantly updating the vaccine.

        I’m the US, it hospitalizes half a million or so a year and kills between 10,000-50,000 a year, comparable to all people who die from gun violence in a year in the US including suicide. We’re always only one unlucky recombination event away from another 1918 flu pandemic, and the more infected people and the more it spreads the more chances for that to happen.

        Sorry, I don’t know if this was your intention, I just have a pet peeve for flu getting written off as no big deal. It’s a huge deal and we should be continuing to work on vaccine and treatment improvements. Oddly our anti viral treatments for covid are probably more effective than anti viral flu treatments at this pont, if people actually take them.

        https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html

        I also cannot believe that after this recent experience governments around the world aren’t pouring even more investment into pandemic monitoring and response. I mean I can, we’re notoriously short sighted, but seems governments and people in general are all pretending the pandemic never happened and can never happen again.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    67 months ago

    Yes, welcome to the endemic. It’s just like the flu at this point where it’ll just be here year round and predictably spike just like the flu.

    • Silverseren
      link
      fedilink
      16
      edit-2
      7 months ago

      I don’t believe the most recent vaccine released is fully up to date with the most recent ascendant variants. Unfortunately, even with the increased speed of conception and production that mRNA vaccines allow, large-scale viral pathogens still manage to mutate at a faster rate.

      If the rate of spread was reduced through other measures than just vaccinations, we’d have a better capability to create up to date versions in time to be relevant.

      But we’re not doing any such measures, are we?

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          87 months ago

          Puts on tinfoil hat

          Considering this research was published a year and a half ago, is any of it going into actual vaccine production? I feel like big pharma loves the idea of needing yearly or bi-yearly covid vaccines far more than the idea of a single vaccine that provides universal antibodies.

          • DarkGamer
            link
            fedilink
            57 months ago

            A typical vaccine development timeline takes 5 to 10 years, and sometimes longer

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              27 months ago

              Removes tinfoil hat

              That makes sense! Hopefully this will allow the Covid vaccine to become a normal single inoculation we can add to our list of “viruses we’ve all but ended”

          • DarkGamer
            link
            fedilink
            4
            edit-2
            7 months ago

            I don’t think that one is available yet, but it could mean an end to this game of covid strain whack-a-mole.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      127 months ago

      Overall people actually need to get the booster to build immunity. And just because you’re vaccinated doesn’t mean you won’t get sick at all. That’s not how this works.

    • Iapar
      link
      fedilink
      107 months ago

      Yes, they updated the vaccine so you get covid from it. It is made by EA now and published by bethesda.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      -197 months ago

      You know that vaccine (including mRNA one) works by exposing you to the pathogen and it is still your immune system that fights it?

      BTW: I don’t hear this being mentioned anywhere, but we already have a traditional covid vaccine called Novavax.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          17 months ago

          They are like subunit vaccines with one extra step. I should probably not use the word pathogen as it is just a part of the virus.

      • prole
        link
        fedilink
        English
        6
        edit-2
        7 months ago

        That’s not how mRNA vaccines work. In fact, most modern vaccines don’t work that way. You’re referring to inoculation which is distinct from vaccination.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        47 months ago

        An mRNA vaccine works like a special set of instructions that tells your body how to make a pretend piece of a germ, but without using any real germ parts. Your body makes, then sees this pretend piece and learns how to protect you against the real germ. It’s like teaching your body to recognize and fight the germ without ever having to meet it for real.

        Remember the COVID spike proteins? That’s what the vaccine is teaching your body about, not any actual viruses.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          17 months ago

          I am familiar with that, but if you start taking this way with antivaxxers you will lose them. This is just an implementation detail, the vaccines in one way or the other expose your immune system to the pathogen so you have opportunity to learn to fight it.

          We have:

          • weakened pathogen or variant that is less harmful (cowpox vs smallpox)
          • inactivated, the virus is there, but insurance of reproducing
          • subunit (just pieces of the virus)
          • mRNA (what you just said)
          • vector (almost there same as mRNA, but delivered by another virus)
          • and more

          The idea is always to teach your immune system to fight it, before we get the real thing. I don’t get why I was down voted to hell.

      • athos77
        link
        fedilink
        17 months ago

        NovaVax has been so frustrating for me! Each shot is always approved like a month after the equivalent Pfizer/Moderna, sometimes multiple months. And by the time it’s finally approved, it’s always been past the window in which I needed to get vaccinated.

        I finally managed to get it this year - but only because I was sick with parainfluenza and everything got pushed back two weeks. If that hadn’t happened, I would’ve had to go with Moderna again.