ThedaCare and public health leaders issued a stark warning about the havoc the COVID-19 omicron variant could wreak in just a few weeks’ time: The variant will develop a stronghold in our region by the end of December and is poised to become the dominant strain by early January.
The message came as part of today’s ThedaCare Community Leader Conversation. Frank Mellon, senior innovation executive, shared that omicron’s transmission rate is twice as high as delta’s, and delta’s is already three times higher than the original COVID strain. In addition, omicron’s growth doubles every two to three days, and its reinfection rate is much higher than that of delta. That means that even those who have been sickened by COVID already and who are vaccinated are still vulnerable.
Vaccine effectiveness against omicron is about 75 percent after three doses and 35 percent after two. “That’s a strong, strong argument for getting the booster,” Mellon said.
Mellon described three scenarios of varying degrees of severity but said the more severe are outcomes are the likeliest, leading to further stretching of already-strained manpower and resources.
ThedaCare President and CEO Dr. Imran Andrabi said even the best-case scenario would prove taxing, with hospitals still battling a surge of the delta variant. Adding omicron into mix will create a major public health issue, he said.
Dr. Mark Cockley, ThedaCare chief clinical officer, said people should get tested if they have symptoms, wear masks in public and maintain social distancing when possible. Andrabi added that people should avoid meeting in person if possible “for the foreseeable future,” and if meeting is unavoidable, people should wear masks.
Cockley reflected that it’s been a year since vaccine efforts began, and progress toward getting large numbers of people inoculated hasn’t come far enough. “Going for a year and still having only 54 to 55 percent of people vaccinated is a little bit disappointing,” he said.
People often dismiss the risk of COVID as getting a mild illness, but those who haven’t been vaccinated have a five times greater risk of getting the disease, 11 times higher chance of being hospitalized and are 12 times more likely to die, Cockley said. Those who do get hospitalized often stay for long periods of time and face a daunting recovery process.
Lynn Detterman, senior vice president for the South Region for ThedaCare, said labor shortages are taking a toll on staff, and data shows two out of five health care workers are considering leaving the profession. As of today, 93 percent of staffed hospital beds are in use statewide, and 96 percent of ICU beds are in use. This affects outcomes for anyone seeking care.
“People choose careers in health care because they want to help people. The demand on resources right now and the inability to help people that they’re used to helping is hard on the staff and our patients,” Detterman said.
Doug Gieryn, director and health officer for the Winnebago County Health Department, said that since September, the highest rates of infection have occurred in children, who are in turn spreading the virus to their families. The region needs to do a better job on vaccinations, and most of the cases of people ending up hospitalized are preventable.
“What we need right now is a bit of a call to action if we’re going to make a significant difference,” Gieryn said. “Businesses (need to be) stepping up to make sure their workers are protected. The mask wearing is really important. We really need to reevaluate right now and strategically plan how are we working together.”
Andrabi said the volume of cases of omicron is projected to be nine times that of delta, and at that rate, hospitals will become overwhelmed. He closed by saying that he hasn’t been as concerned in the past two years of the pandemic as he is now.
“We can potentially come together and stop this chaos. If we don’t do it, I don’t know who does it. If we don’t have any place to bring people in, I can’t even begin to imagine what that looks like for our community,” he said. “We are at a point where we do have a tsunami coming at us again, and this could potentially be bigger than anything we’ve seen before, and we must act.”
