Senior News Line: COVID is still here

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of COVID cases has steadily risen since December.

Earlier in the fall, COVID took a short break while the flu and respiratory syncytial virus made it to center stage. Those illnesses are now waning a bit, and here comes COVID again.

It doesn’t help that we have a new variant — an offshoot of Omicron, the XBB.1.5 — taking off around the country. By Christmas, nearly half the cases of COVID were that new variant, so it’s growing.

Seniors, as usual, are being hit hard with those in the age 70-plus range being the largest group affected, followed by ages 60 to 69.

If you’re hesitant to go back to being extremely careful, we’re experiencing what some doctors are calling the “senior wave.”

It means the numbers on a graph show that the largest group affected with hospitalizations are seniors — which means it’s still not time to let down our guard. If anything, it means renewing our efforts to stay safe.

Frequent hand-washing, wearing a mask in the store, even if you’re the only one who is, staying out of large groups — we know how to do this.

And like it or not, we should. The growing number of seniors being hospitalized or dying due to COVID should shake up all of us.

Another, and possibly even more accurate, statistic for the spread of COVID is the wastewater. This is where municipalities test the sewage for COVID.

People can hide their exposure and illness by using the at-home tests we all received in the mail, thereby skewing the “official” numbers, but the sewage in an area is sure to be more accurate.

To see the wastewater data by county, go online to CDC.gov and search for “National Wastewater Surveillance System.”