August 16, 2023 – The number of recent weekly hospital admissions for COVID-19 increased for the fourth week in a row.
Nationwide, 10,320 people were hospitalized within the week ending August 5, up from 9,026 the week before. This represents a rise of about 14% from the previous week, in line with the newly updated CDC Numbers. The variety of hospital admissions reached a historic low in July at around 6,300 per week.
The CDC stopped tracking the number of individuals infected with the virus earlier this yr and now relies on hospitalization data to evaluate the present impact of COVID-19.
“We have to remember that we are still dealing with numbers that are far below those we have seen during the pandemic,” said Dr. John Brownstein, professor of biomedical informatics at Harvard Medical School, ABC News“We need to zoom out and look at our experiences throughout the pandemic to understand that what we are facing now is a far cry from the crises we experienced in previous waves.”
The currently dominant variant stays EG.5, and experts consider it’s neither more severe nor more contagious than other newer variants. Whether EG.5 continues to make more people sick might be seen on Friday, when the CDC updates its variant estimates.
Brownstein told ABC News that one reason for concern about rising COVID numbers, despite their overall low levels, is that there was a spike in the summertime of 2021 with the harmful Delta variant.
“But every new variant that has emerged so far has subsequently had less impact on the population,” he said. “Now, is it possible that we will see a variant in the future that is of concern? Absolutely. But overall, we have seen a weakening of the impact with the last few variants that have emerged.”