Quick Take
The Dominican Oaks retirement community in Santa Cruz saw a spike in COVID cases over the past few weeks. While that outbreak is now waning, and fortunately resulted in just mild illness for the affected residents, public health officials are keeping a close eye on new subvariants that could cause a surge of cases in the coming months.
A COVID outbreak at Santa Cruz’s Dominican Oaks retirement community that began last week is beginning to cool off as public health officials keep a close eye on local disease prevalence and the emergence of a new subvariant that could spark a summer surge.
Out of about 220 total residents in the facility, between 20 and 30 had tested positive as of Wednesday afternoon, said Marketing and Community Relations Manager Cheir Harty, adding that the retirement community just behind Dominican Hospital has been in a “soft close” since early last week. That means the administration suspended communal events and activities, delivered meals to residents’ rooms rather than have them congregate in the dining commons, and encouraged masking.
Harty said Dominican Oaks responds to all communicable disease outbreaks this way, and it adequately quelled the most recent COVID spike. She said the facility is on “the tail end of cases,” and is set to resume normal operations Monday. She added that, thankfully, residents who tested positive experienced only mild illness and did not require medical attention, and spoke to the difference between the early stages of the pandemic and where we stand today.
“We have meds, vaccines and boosters we can offer residents annually,” Harty said. “It’s a different climate for sure, but we take outbreaks very seriously and respond the same way we would with any virus.”
The spike at Dominican Oaks appears isolated as of now, but a summer surge could be on the horizon, said Santa Cruz County Health Officer Dr. Lisa Hernandez.
“We do look better [than earlier in the year], but we might see a rise in cases later this summer, around the end of June and Fourth of July,” she said.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a new COVID variant called KP.2 made up 28% of new infections as of early May, compared to just 4% in late March. It is one of a handful of subvariants referred to as FLiRT variants, named after the technical names for their mutations. All of them are descendents of Omicron that show the same set of mutations that could make the virus more contagious.
Hernandez said that some county data is pointing toward a possible summer spike. COVID prevalence in local wastewater has been mostly flat since mid-March, but began slightly ticking up in early May and is projected to rise a bit more. She also said that the current reproductive number — the number of secondary infections caused by a single original infection — has been above 1 for all of May, “so there’s some worry of spread.”
Although the cases at Dominican Oaks were luckily not serious, severe illness still happens. Local COVID hospitalizations in May have been slightly higher than expected — those peaked at around six despite projections expecting just two or three for most of the month. However, that’s still a far cry from the year’s peak in January, when 16 people were in the hospital with COVID.
Hernandez said several factors could drive a summer surge. Holiday celebrations and vacations will see more people traveling and interacting with people from all over, vaccine protection will be waning, and many are not up to date with the most recent jab. Just over 22% of Santa Cruz County residents received the reformulated vaccine rolled out in the fall, according to state data.
Now, with the new FLiRT variants circulating, Hernandez expects the CDC to roll out yet another reformulated vaccine in the fall, and to continue to do so annually. Adults 65 and older are already able to get an additional dose of last fall’s reformulated vaccine through either their health care provider or major pharmacy chains.
But until that next vaccine rollout, people should remain diligent in the face of a possible spike in the coming months, said Hernandez. That means staying home when sick, washing hands frequently and masking if one sees fit.
And of course, Hernandez highly recommends the next vaccine when the time comes.
“We know that people are tired of COVID and probably vaccinations. Unfortunately, COVID is going to stay,” she said. “But fortunately, we know how to be best protected, and we know that getting vaccinated reduces your risk of getting COVID, but more importantly of getting severe disease or succumbing to it.”
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