BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – Health experts were predicting a spike in COVID cases after the holiday, and that’s exactly what we’re seeing in Louisiana right now.
At the beginning of 2023, the WAFB met with Dr. Joseph Kanter of the Louisiana Department of Health and Human Services, who is the main face you’ve seen since the pandemic began.
Kanter said we’re in a good place. You’ve noticed a surge in COVID counts over the past few weeks over the holiday period. The good news is that there doesn’t seem to be a lot of hospitalization.
He said this is similar to the spike we had a few months ago. A lot of COVID was transmitted, but we didn’t overwhelm the hospitals.
This is a sign that we are moving further out of the acute phase of the pandemic and into a longer-term case of COVID. Kanter said we can’t wait for the virus to go away. It’ll be with us like the flu and RSV for a while, but it won’t overwhelm Louisiana.
Anyone six months and older can receive the updated bivalent booster vaccines.
“I think what we’re seeing now is more cases, more transmission, which is understandable given the holidays and the crowds, but fortunately because at this point about 95% of the state has either had COVID in the past or been vaccinated , or both,” said Kanter. “Fortunately, these cases are not severe cases and are not overwhelming hospitals like we did earlier in the pandemic.”
Anyone six months and older can receive the updated bivalent booster vaccines. As you may have noticed, this is a different booster shot than the first vaccines. The first vaccines were aimed exclusively against the original COVID strain. Since then, the virus has mutated several times.
The updated boosters add a newer form of COVID, including one of the Omicron variants we’ve already covered.
LDH reported in December that the flu had reached its highest level in five years. This comes as health experts across the country have also been concerned about the triple pandemic – or COVID, RSV and the flu – going around at the same time. Kanter said we’re in a much better place than other states.
“To be honest, Louisiana has been very fortunate with these respiratory viruses for the past few weeks. Other parts of the country weren’t so lucky. Other parts of the country have been hit by COVID and flu and RSV all at exactly the same time and this is terrible news for hospitals as hospitals are already very busy during most flu seasons,” Kanter explained.
He thankfully said that wasn’t the case in Louisiana this season. We had an early RSV peak a few months ago and our flu season seems to be just around the corner.
Congress has been exploring ways to continue funding much of the federal COVID work, but at some point these vaccines will no longer be free.
They expect insurance and Medicaid to cover that.
For others there might be a fee.
This isn’t the case yet, so get your vaccine now while it’s still covered.
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