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SALT LAKE CITY — Utah health officials reported 4,661 new COVID-19 cases and seven additional deaths on Tuesday.
Although case counts already appear high, hospital officials warned that the situation is likely to get worse before it gets better.
"It is going to come in and go out like a tornado," said Dr. Russell Vinik, chief medical operations officer at University of Utah Health, of the now-prevalent omicron variant.
The next month will be "tough" for everyone, he said.
Hospitals preparing for another surge
Although Utah started to see a downturn in hospitalizations about two weeks ago, treatment hubs for the coronavirus are now beginning to see another surge.
Since Christmas, there's been a greater-than-400% increase in admissions at University Hospital in Salt Lake City due to COVID-19 and COVID-related illnesses, according to Vinik.
"That has obviously created some strain, but in addition to that what we've seen is a lot of our staff … have gotten sick as well, and we've seen that number increasing," he said Tuesday.
That increase has led the system to announce it will on Wednesday begin postponing some nonessential surgeries.
Hundreds of employees at the hospital, including direct health care workers and support staff, are out with COVID-19 mostly due to community transmission, but that impacts patient care, according to Vinik.
"So we are having to reduce the number of beds available to our patients at least for the near future," he said.
The system plans to remove 52 beds — about 10% of the hospital's capacity. On Tuesday, he said 12 people were in the emergency room waiting for a bed to open up.
Vinik said the hospital isn't seeing as high of a hospitalization rate as with the delta variant — as omicron now likely accounts for 90% of cases in Utah — but with surging cases, hospitals expect "significantly" higher COVID-related hospitalizations statewide.
Dr. Robert Glasgow, chairman of the department of surgery at U. Health, said the system is planning to delay "quality of life" surgeries like those for joint replacement and hernia. Life-saving surgeries, such as those for cancer patients will proceed, he said.
"My wish for Christmas was that we wouldn't have to do this, but here we are," Glasgow said, adding that he hopes the community "gets through this, hopefully soon rather than later."
The rolling, seven-day average for new cases is now 3,754 per day, and the average positive rate of people getting tested is 21%, the Utah Department of Health said.
Tuesday marked the second recent day that the state approached its record case count. The current record occurred on Dec. 30, 2020, when 4,706 cases were confirmed in a single day.
Meanwhile, the U.S. set a global record of almost 1 million new COVID-19 cases on Monday, according to a Reuters tally. That is nearly double the national peak of 505,109 that was reached one week ago.
Throughout Utah, 15,056 people were tested for the coronavirus since Monday. On Tuesday, 479 patients were being treated for the disease at hospitals throughout the state, which is an increase of 13 since the previous day and an increase of 41 since the previous Tuesday, Dec. 28.
More Utah data
School-age children accounted for 651 of the new cases reported on Tuesday — 249 cases were ages 5-10, 126 cases were ages 11-13, and 276 cases were ages 14-17.
"Another record breaking number of #Covid_19 cases. Hospitals stopping elective surgeries. Unvaccinated and immunocompromised at highest risk for severe COVID-19 illness. Wear a mask. Get vaccinated/boosted," Dr. Angela Dunn, executive director of the Salt Lake County Health Department and former state epidemiologist, tweeted.
SLCoHD has issued a public health advisory in response to the record-breaking transmission of #COVID19 in our community. The advisory, which is in effect through January 31, 2022, strongly encourages people who live and work in Salt Lake County to take extra precautions.
— Salt Lake Health (@SaltLakeHealth) January 4, 2022
(1/2) pic.twitter.com/JVsd7Mpdm8
Health care workers administered another 12,319 vaccine doses, bringing the total number given in Utah to 4,576,939. That includes booster shots. Now 63.4% of Utahns ages 5 and older have been fully vaccinated with their first two doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, or the first dose of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, and 34.8% of residents have received a booster shot.
Of the new cases, 2,272 are "breakthrough," among people who are fully vaccinated more than two weeks before testing positive for the disease. One additional death was confirmed as breakthrough. Now, 72,331 breakthrough cases (about 11% of all cases) and 353 breakthrough deaths (about 9.2% of all COVID-19 deaths in Utah) have been confirmed since the vaccine became available.
In the last 28 days, unvaccinated residents have faced 20.1 times greater risk of dying from COVID-19, 9.6 times greater risk of hospitalization, and 2.8 times greater risk of testing positive for COVID-19 than vaccinated people, the state health department said in a statement.
Since Feb. 1, unvaccinated residents have experienced 7.1 times greater risk of dying from COVID-19, 5.6 times greater risk of hospitalization, and 2.3 times greater risk of testing positive for COVID-19 than vaccinated people, according to the data.
The deaths reported Tuesday include:
- A Washington County man between the ages of 45 and 64, who was hospitalized when he died
- A Washington County woman, 65-84, hospitalized
- A Box Elder County woman, 65-84, hospitalized
- A Salt Lake County man, 25-44, hospitalized
- A Salt Lake County woman, older than 85, hospitalized
- A Salt Lake County woman, 25-44, hospitalized
- A Carbon County man, 65-84, unknown hospitalization status
