City officials are hopeful that this most recent COVID surge has reached its peak, although they say more time needs to pass before they can make a definitive call.
“I’m asked often if we are at our plateau and I hope that that is the case,” said Dr. Sara Beth Hartlage, the city’s associate medical director. “We have seen a little bit of leveling off. We’ll need to see that over a few more days or a week or so to be really confident that we’ve hit that plateau.”
The week of Jan. 8, there were 16.3K cases of COVID reported in Louisville — a record high. This past week, there were 16.2K. Mayor Greg Fischer said that Louisville wastewater data is also indicating a plateau.
Hartlage warned that a peak does not mean that the city is clear on the Omicron front.
“We’ll still have just as many cases on our way down the backside of the curve as we did up the frontside," she said.
And, as hospitalizations lag behind case counts, Louisville’s medical facilities are the fullest they’ve ever been: There are 527 COVID patients in local hospitals, a 31% increase over the previous record of 399. Over 70 of those patients are in the ICU and 50 are on ventilators.
Deaths, however, have not increased yet under omicron and have even trended down since Christmas. Six people died last week from COVID.
There is another silver lining: Vaccinations have gone up slightly, said Hartlage.
Currently, 73.6% of Louisvillians have received their first dose of the vaccine, 63.2% of Louisvillians have completed their series and 41.7% have received their booster.
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