Los Angeles County sees more Omicron fatalities as COVID-19 deaths rise

COVID-19 deaths in Los Angeles County have skyrocketed in the past week, and officials say most of the recent fatalities appear to be from the Omicron variant.

The spread of the latest variant of the coronavirus has advanced with unprecedented speed since December, though officials have said people infected with Omicron generally have less severe symptoms than with the earlier Delta variant. Still, authorities say it's deadly for some.

Of the 102 deaths recorded on Thursday - the highest number in a single day since March 10 - 90% corresponded to people who fell ill with COVID-19 after Christmas, and 80% to those who fell ill after the day of New Year, which indicates a high probability of infection by Ómicron, exposed the director of Public Health of the County of Los Angeles, Bárbara Ferrer.

It appears that the people who are dying from the Omicron variant are deteriorating much faster than those infected with earlier variants, Ferrer told reporters.

"It means that the people who end up dying from COVID, if they were infected with Ómicron, it seems that it affects them more quickly," said Ferrer.

During Delta's summer surge, COVID-19 patients were diagnosed with a coronavirus infection or began to have symptoms four to five weeks before their death. But among the fatalities reported late last week, many had an onset of symptoms or a first diagnosis three weeks or before their death.

"It's a relatively short period between when someone gets infected, shows symptoms, and dies," Ferrer said.

During the seven-day period ending Sunday, Los Angeles County is averaging 61 COVID-19 deaths a day, according to a Times analysis of state data released Monday. This exceeds the spring 2020 surge at the start of the pandemic, which peaked at 50 deaths a day; the first wave of the summer, with 49 deaths a day; and last summer's Delta surge, which peaked at 35.

But last winter's surge was significantly worse: About 240 deaths were reported daily in Los Angeles County.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said he believes "we're in a better place" compared to last winter, given Omicron's overall lower severity, even though it's more widespread.

But the rising death toll cannot be ignored or dismissed, officials say.

“We are still walking in the valley of death when we see more than 100 people in my city, my county, die in a single day like what happened last week,” Garcetti said. “And somehow that has become normalized, or we don't think about it as constantly as we used to. I do. I still think about it. I pray for it every night. I pray for it in the morning when I wake up.”

There are also growing signs that new Omicron cases have peaked in California. However, authorities expect hospitals to continue to have problems for days and weeks, and deaths from the winter surge to continue.

“The fact that Omicron is so infectious has created a bigger problem” than other features of the variant itself, said Dr. Armand Dorian, executive director of USC Verdugo Hills Hospital in Glendale.

“The virus itself is not as deadly as the Delta. There are not so many people who get it that are in critical condition or who go to the ICU. But there are more people who get infected, that is, many more, ”says Dorian.

That means that “although a smaller percentage of infected people end up with severe illness, the sheer number of cases has led to a high number of deaths.”

The rampant infectiousness of the Omicron variant has also alienated a greater number of healthcare workers who fall ill, creating staffing problems in hospitals and other healthcare facilities.

"How do we serve a nursing home or a skilled nursing facility? Because they're understaffed. It's a chain. And if one link breaks, everything goes backwards," Dorian explained.

Dorian said that a few weeks ago, about 10% of the USC Verdugo Hills staff was furloughed. As workers have recovered, that number has dropped to about 3%, he said.

The crisis has been especially noticeable in emergency services: During previous waves, "people didn't use the ER unless they were really sick" and people with illnesses other than COVID didn't go either, Dorian said. "Now they do."

More than a third of Glendale hospital patients are positive for the coronavirus, though some are "incidental" patients who came to the hospital for something different and were tested and found to have the virus when they arrived, Dorian said.

He calculated that 70% of his coronavirus-positive patients “are here because of COVID.”

By some estimates, 80% to 90% of Omicron infections result in no symptoms, but the unprecedented surge in cases linked to the new variant could lead to record hospital admissions in some countries, said Dr. Christopher Murray, director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, in a commentary for The Lancet.

Across the country, some 145,000 cases of coronavirus have been registered in hospitals in recent days. This is more than the previous peak of the pandemic, 124,000, recorded last winter.

Across the United States, the daily average number of deaths from COVID-19 this winter has exceeded that of the Delta wave of the summer. In recent days, the country was registering an average of almost 2,000 deaths a day, surpassing the summer maximum of about 1,900 a day. The latest figure is still lower than last winter's record 3,400 daily deaths.

"While cases and hospitalizations remain high, it is the increase in deaths that is of greater concern," the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health said in a statement. Unvaccinated people in Los Angeles County were 23 times more likely to die from COVID-19 compared to those who are fully inoculated, according to recent data.

“Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have recognized that while many experience mild illness from COVID, there are others who will not fare well if they become infected,” Ferrer said in a statement Friday.

The number of positive coronavirus patients in Los Angeles County intensive care units continues to rise. As of Sunday, there were 794 positive coronavirus patients in Los Angeles County ICUs, 28% more than the previous week. The latest figure is the highest in almost a year, but is still less than half the record of 1,731 from January 8, 2021.

The number of hospitalized coronavirus patients has begun to level off. Over the last week, Los Angeles County reported between 4,500 and 4,800 patients, numbers that stopped rising significantly at the end of last week.

And daily new coronavirus cases appear to be declining. On Sunday, LA County saw an average of 31,000 cases a day over the past week, according to state data released Monday; more than a week ago, the average was 40,000 to 44,000 cases a day, a record.

However, the rate of cases is not declining uniformly. Analysis of the wastewater indicates that while the central and western areas show slightly lower levels of the coronavirus, viral levels in the eastern and southern parts of the county remain elevated, Ferrer said.

The wastewater data correlates with areas now reporting the highest rates of coronavirus cases, including South LA, Southeast LA County, East LA, Northeast San Fernando Valley and parts of the San Gabriel Valley. This marks a change from December, when the highest case rates in the county were in the wealthier communities of the Malibu Coast, the Westside, the southern San Fernando Valley and the Hollywood Hills communities.

At that time, "those most likely to become infected were travelers, those who went to entertainment venues and those who mixed in places where many were nearby while they did not have the protection of masks," Ferrer explained. “Some of the recent changes associated with widespread community transmission likely reflect the fact that we are now seeing increased transmission among those whose jobs bring them into close contact with others and who often live in crowded housing.”

Coronavirus case rates are higher among Latino and black residents compared to whites. For every 100,000 Latino residents, there were about 3,600 cases in a two-week period, and for every 100,000 Black residents, there were 2,700 cases. For every 100,000 Asian American residents, there were 2,300, and for every 100,000 white residents, there were 2,100.

Vaccination rates among Black and Latino residents of Los Angeles County continue to be lower than those of other racial and ethnic groups. For those age 5 and older, 58% of Blacks and 64% of Latinos have received at least one dose; 77% of Whites, 82% of Native Americans, and 87% of Asian American residents have received one.

Health authorities have expressed concern about low vaccination rates among children aged 5 to 11 years. Only 29% of children in that age group in Los Angeles County have received at least one dose. By comparison, in San Francisco, 71% of children in that age group have received at least one dose of the vaccine.

"This creates significant vulnerability for further spread, not just among children, but among all of us," Ferrer said.

With coronavirus transmission rates still extraordinarily high, health officials and experts continue to urge people to do everything they can to avoid becoming infected: Wear a mask indoors in public places and avoid non-essential gatherings, especially indoors and in places where face coverings are not worn, such as in restaurants and bars.

In a study published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology Letters, Yale University researchers recently found that restaurant servers were more frequently exposed to airborne coronavirus particles compared to other workers in high-risk settings. , according to a report summarizing the results of a study in which mobile viral detectors clipped to shirt collars were used for five days that collected virus-laden aerosols and droplets.

Of the 62 detectors that were returned to investigators, five picked up coronaviruses. Four of them were carried by restaurant waiters and one by a staff member at a homeless shelter. Two of the restaurant waiters' sensors had exceptionally high viral loads, "suggesting close contact with one or more infected individuals," according to the report.

Authorities are urging people to catch up on COVID-19 vaccinations and booster shots. While 3 million Los Angeles County residents age 12 and older have received their booster shot, another 3 million are eligible but have not yet received one.

There is increasing evidence that postponing the booster vaccination is risky, as immunity to COVID-19 declines in the months following completion of the primary vaccination series.

Data presented by Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, showed that for the Omicron variant, two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech primary vaccination series o Moderna caused the efficacy against hospitalization to drop to only 57% more than six months after the second dose. A booster dose raised the efficacy of the vaccine against hospitalization to 90%.

That study did not examine Johnson & Johnson's single-dose vaccine, which does not use the same mRNA technology as Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. However, US health authorities said in December that, in general, it is preferable to use any of the mRNA vaccines instead of Johnson & Johnson's - both for the primary series and for booster doses - citing the risk of rare but serious blood clots.

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