Health officials bracing for rising COVID wave to hit Santa Cruz County

Santa Cruz County is not yet seeing the spike in COVID cases sweeping the broader Bay Area, but local health officials say they are bracing for a new wave in the coming weeks. 

County Public Health Officer Dr. Lisa Hernandez said COVID cases are still lower than they were this time last year. However, based on COVID levels detected in local wastewater, the spread of the virus appears to be increasing much faster across the region than it had been in previous months.

The county’s effective reproduction number for COVID is currently 1.1, Hernandez said. The figure represents the average number of secondary cases caused by a primary case calculated over a five-day moving average. If the figure is below 1, spread is decreasing, and if it’s above 1, spread is increasing.

The uptick comes with vaccination rates for the most recent COVID booster remaining low. California Department of Public Health data shows that only 18.8% of Santa Cruz County residents, and just 12% of all Californians, have received the latest jab. 

“One of the biggest protections for anyone, whether you’re more vulnerable or not for getting severe disease, is the vaccine,” Hernandez said. “I don’t want the fact to be lost that the vaccine continues to be protective.”

Ronda Hatcher, director of infection prevention at Dominican Hospital, said the hospital has not yet seen a post-New Year’s spike of COVID cases. Multiple respiratory viruses are circulating in the community, she said, including colds, influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), noting that hospital admissions and emergency room visits for COVID have remained steady. 

Hatcher also pointed to county wastewater data trends that suggest an increase in cases is coming over the next several weeks, and said officials expect a rising number of hospitalizations for COVID because of it. 

The U.S. is in the midst of a national coronavirus wave, with data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that the level of COVID in the country’s wastewater hit its second-highest peak since the pandemic began, according to a chart by Columbia University science communicator Lucky Chan that was widely shared on X, formerly known as Twitter, earlier this month. 

The wave has been less obvious to many locals than previous ones in part because fewer people are getting tested for COVID. Test kits are not as readily available as they were at earlier points of the pandemic, Hernandez said, so public health organizations have turned to tracking levels of the virus in the wastewater supply.

The recent spike is thanks to a particularly contagious new Omicron subvariant, referred to as JN.1. As many as 60% of recent COVID cases across the U.S. are linked to JN.1, according to the CDC. The variant is a descendant of BA.2.86 that has undergone one or two more mutations to gain efficient transmission capabilities. It possesses its parent’s ability to evade immunity, but it has now evolved to spread more effectively.

Hernandez said that while the JN.1 variant does not seem to be making people sicker than previous variants, it still carries similar risks for people who are particularly vulnerable to serious health complications because of COVID.

As more and more people began treating COVID as a thing of the past, fewer of us have been wearing masks. Big social gatherings are working their way back to people’s daily lives – with Hernandez and Hatcher pointing to indoor gatherings during the recent holiday period as contributing to increases in COVID and other respiratory viruses.

Hatcher urged people to get vaccinated and boosted for COVID and other respiratory viruses, to carry a mask to wear in enclosed or crowded areas and frequently wash or sanitize their hands.

Hernandez, meanwhile, echoed familiar guidance on slowing the spread.

“Stay home when you’re sick,” she said. “No matter whether it’s COVID, flu, RSV, regular cold, because that helps you get better as well as helps.”

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