The White House today announced it will send 5 million free rapid COVID-19 antigen tests and the same number of free polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests to schools each month to help K-12 buildings stay open.
The steps are part of continued efforts to keep schools open for in-person learning among record-breaking daily COVID-19 cases caused by the highly transmissible Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant.
Jeff Zients, the COVID-19 pandemic coordinator for the Biden administration, said today at a press briefing that the new tests will be added to the $130 billion already allocated in the American Rescue Plan to keep schools open during the pandemic.
During the briefing, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Rochelle Walensky, MD, MPH, shared new numbers on the pandemic: The new 7-day daily average of new daily cases is 751,000, a 47% increase from the previous week. The daily average of hospitalizations is up 33%, to 19,800, and deaths rose to 1,600 per day.
The United States reported 752,387 new COVID-19 cases yesterday and 2,641 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins COVID-19 tracker.
More data on Omicron severity
During the briefing, Walensky detailed data from a preprint study based on 70,000 patients seen in the Kaiser Permanente health system in California, which is the first major US study to compare infections in the Omicron wave to the Delta (B1617.2) wave. The study tracked COVID-19 patents from Nov 30, 2021 to Jan 1 of this year.
Roughly 75% of the 70,000 COVID-19 positive patients were infected with the Omicron variant.
"While we are seeing early evidence that Omicron is less severe than Delta, it's important to know Omicron is much more transmissible than Delta," she said. "But the risk of hospitalization remains low."
Patients with COVID-19 caused by Omicron had a 53% reduction in hospitalization than those during the Delta wave, and, strikingly, no patient with Omicron required mechanical ventilation.
If hospitalized, those infected with Omicron have a shorter hospital stay, of just 1.6 days compared with 5 days for Delta, the study found. Overall, 90% of patients hospitalized because of the new variant were discharged within 3 days.
Though preliminary, the California data echo what has been seen in South Africa and the United Kingdom, Walensky said.
Public school attendance drops
Public school attendance across the United States has dropped to unusually low levels, with many students either out sick with COVID-19 or being kept home by anxious parents, the Wall Street Journal reports.
In an astounding jump, more than 580,000 child COVID-19 cases were reported from Dec 30 to Jan 6, a 78% increase over the previous week, according to the latest update from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).
"Nearly 8.5 million children have tested positive for COVID-19 since the onset of the pandemic; nearly 11% of these cases have been added in the past two weeks," the AAP said. "For the 22nd week in a row, child COVID-19 cases are above 100,000. Since the first week of September, there have been over 3.4 million additional child cases."
Cities try new Omicron strategies
Across the country, mayors are trying new strategies to mitigate the Omicron surge.
Yesterday Washington, DC, Mayor Muriel Bowser imposed a public health emergency in the District until late January, the Washington Post reports. The action will allow hospitals to address staffing needs and other concerns as hospitalizations rise throughout the region.
And today in the Twin Cities, mayors Jacob Frey (Minneapolis) and Melvin Carter (St. Paul) said they will be requiring negative tests or vaccination cards for entry into Twin City venues, bars, and restaurants beginning Jan 19. Children under 2 will be exempt from the requirement, but children ages 2 to 5 are expected to show a negative test.
Several cities, including New York, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia, have already implemented such requirements.
The CDC COVID Data Tracker shows that 62.6% of Americans are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, 74.5% have received at least one dose of vaccine, and 36.7% of vaccinated Americans have received a booster dose.
Other US developments
- A report from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund shows that, for the second year in a row, COVID-19 was the leading cause of death for police officers, according to the New York Times.
- The medical director of Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center in Los Angeles told ABC News that the hospital is in "complete disaster mode" and in far worse shape than at any time during the pandemic.
- The Food and Drug Administration yesterday amended the fact sheet for Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccine to include a rare risk of immune thrombocytopenia, Reuters reports.
