hospitalizations

Idaho’s hospitals are feeling the strain from the “tripledemic” of RSV, flu and COVID-19, officials say. Dr. Jim Souza is the chief physician executive at St. Luke’s Health System in Boise.

Officials say children have lowest vaccination rate, urge regular masking in crowded, confined spaces

Similar to the national trends, the patients being hospitalized in Washington are now overwhelmingly young and middle-aged adults — not older Americans who are mostly vaccinated at this point.

After spending much of the past year tending to elderly patients, doctors are seeing a clear demographic shift: young and middle-aged adults make up a growing share of the patients in COVID-19 hospital wards.

Known as “breakthrough infections,” cases in which people test positive for COVID-19 after being fully vaccinated are extremely rare. Public health experts are anxious that these cases not be blown out of proportion and discourage people from getting vaccinated. Yet they also say it’s critical to track and study these cases, because scientists do not fully understand who is susceptible to vaccine failure.

Ever since the coronavirus reached the U.S., officials and citizens alike have gauged the severity of the spread by tracking one measure in particular: How many new cases are confirmed through testing each day. However, it has been clear all along that this number is an understatement because of testing shortfalls.

On Tuesday, Gov. Jay Inslee announced a phased reopening plan for restaurants and gyms, that is not set entirely by a county-by-county approach, as before. In Phase 2, restaurants and gyms can resume indoor dining/activities at 25% capacity. But in order to qualify to move there, four metrics will have to be trending downward including a 10% reduction in COVID case rates, hospitalizations and ICU bed occupancy in the region.

The number of confirmed cases of the coronavirus in California has surpassed 2 million, according to Johns Hopkins University, as the virus has spread with startling speed in the state. It's the first state to pass that number. In the last day, according to Johns Hopkins, California saw 43,986 new cases and 319 deaths.

“I don’t know that there’s been anyone who’s a bigger advocate for changing behavior,” Gov. Brad Little said Thursday. “What I want is compliance. And we’re just having an issue (with compliance).”

“Unfortunately, I think within the next week it’s going to be a significant rise in COVID-19,” said Dr. Kevin Caserta, the chief medical officer for Providence SW Washington. Already, the two hospitals Caserta oversees, St. Peter and Providence Centralia, have seen a near doubling of COVID patients over the past six to eight weeks – from roughly 25 to nearly 50 today.