Covid Cases Spike in NYC as New Omicron Subvariant BQ.1.1 Spreads in US
© AP Photo / Ted Shaffrey
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A new COVID-19 subvariant is beginning to make its presence felt in the United States after driving a new outbreak in densely populated Singapore. The news comes as Americans brace for a third winter with the respiratory virus and the Biden administration continues to shed pandemic emergency protections.
The positivity rate of COVID-19 tests in parts of New York City is rising rapidly, reaching more than one case in five, according to local media.
In the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood on Manhattan island, city data showed a positivity rate of 22.5% on Wednesday, and the island overall showed a 7% increase in cases over the previous two weeks. Staten Island, another NYC borough, recorded an overall average positivity rate of 6.89% over the previous week. Case numbers in the entire city of 8 million have hovered around 2,000 per day.
While densely populated New York is especially prone to rapid outbreaks, a new subvariant of Omicron, dubbed BQ.1.1, has recently been detected in the US. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), this new subvariant is estimated to be responsible for 11% of cases in the US over the last week and 36.6% of cases in New York in that time.
The Omicron Family
The variant, along with its parent, BQ.1, both descend from Omicron, the immune-evading COVID-19 variant that’s fueled Covid cases worldwide since November 2021. However, doctors aren’t sure if its new differences will give it an advantage over Omicron BA.5, the most recent dominant subvariant.
The White House’s chief medical adviser, Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), told CBS on October 14 that the newly introduced bivalent booster vaccines, which are designed to protect against BA.4 and BA.5, will “almost certainly” provide “some” protection against the new subvariants as well.
Omicron’s evasion of immune protections, thanks to the many modifications to its chief infection tool, the spike protein, has frustrated efforts to end the pandemic via mass vaccination. Where vaccination previously aimed at minimizing or preventing illness, now Western health experts hope it will minimize hospitalization and death.
By contrast, China has maintained a “dynamic zero Covid” policy through 2021, utilizing lockdowns and mass testing to keep smaller outbreaks from running rampant through the population. As a result, China has almost uniquely been spared the mass sickness and death of the rest of the globe, counting just a few thousand deaths since 2019.
In the United States, more than 1,060,000 have died from COVID-19, although deaths have stayed below 700 per day for the last six months, according to CDC data. On Tuesday, the 7-day moving average was 323 deaths per day.
Winter Is Coming
However, winter is fast approaching in the US, which will drive people indoors, where the virus can spread much more easily. Without most of the pandemic safety mandates, such as mask-wearing, social distancing, and sick leave for workers, experts worry the US could be in for a major new outbreak.
That said, the CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) voted unanimously on Thursday to add the COVID-19 vaccine to the CDC’s recommended immunization schedules for both children and adults. The schedule is not a requirement, and the ultimate decision remains up to local school districts, Dr. Nirav Shah, an ACIP member and Director of Maine's CDC, told Reuters.
"Adding the COVID-19 vaccine to the recommended childhood immunization schedule does not constitute a requirement that any child receive the vaccine," Shah said on Thursday. "The decision around school entrance for vaccines rests where it did before, which is with the state level, the county level and at the municipal level.”
Cities such as Washington, DC, have delayed requiring COVID-19 vaccination for students several times, although staff are still required to be vaccinated. Earlier this month, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced the Golden State would become the first in the nation to require student vaccination statewide.
