You know things are going badly with COVID-19 when it’s not worth the effort to warn people anymore.
New Hampshire public health officials announced last week that they would cut way back on contact tracing, the process of alerting people who have been in contact with somebody who tested positive for COVID-19.
Contact tracing is useful when a contagious disease is relatively rare because it can contain outbreaks before they spread. People can be warned about a previously unsuspected danger and take action, getting tested or hunkering down.
But once infection is circulating widely, tracing the contact of each positive case doesn’t accomplish much because everybody who has been in contact with anybody else is already in danger of infection. There’s no point in finding them and telling them except for certain extreme situations, such as in nursing homes.
“As community transmission increases, it becomes a less effective strategy of identifying and breaking the chains of transmission,” is how State Epidemiologist Dr. Benjamin Chan put it in the weekly briefing.
Even more than the startling rise in case numbers that New Hampshire has seen, this change in policy is a sober reflection of how quickly the pandemic has gone from being under control in New Hampshire to getting out of control.
And the numbers are startling. On Friday more than 460 new cases were identified – 140 more than the day before, which was 90 more than the day before.
The 14-day average of new cases being tracked by the Monitor doubled in the past two weeks, from 109 to 250.
If this exponential growth continues, then by Thanksgiving we’ll be seeing more new cases every two days than we saw during the entire month of August.
Hospitalizations have also started rising sharply, doubling from 30 to 69 in two weeks.
One bright: COVID-related deaths have been increasing slowly, with about one person a day dying.
Back in the spring, health officials were warning that no matter what happened in the summer things would get worse in the fall – just as they did during the Spanish Flu of 1918, and during regular flu seasons. That prediction is coming true with a vengeance.
More than ever, it makes sense to wear masks, socially distance yourself, avoid unnecessary contact, and get a flu shot. COVID-19 vaccines will be coming next year. Just stay healthy until they arrive!
Here’s how we’re doing on the weekly metrics that the Monitor has been tracking since the start of summer
You can see the charts I update on weekdays (and some weekends) here: Daily new cases – hospitalizations – deaths.
Goal 1: No sustained increase in number of new hospitalizations related to COVID-19. Have we met this goal? No.
There were 38 people in the hospital with COVID at the start of the month and 64 on Thursday, Nov. 13.
Goal 2: A two-week drop in new cases. Have we met this goal? No.
As noted above, the number of new cases identified through PCR and antigen tests is increasing faster now than it did at the start of the pandemic,
Goal 3: Fewer than four new cases per 100,000 people each day, or 54 new cases a day. Have we met this goal? No.
The state has seen more than four new cases per 100,000 residents even single day since Oct. 7.
Goal 4: Conducting at least 150 PCR tests per 100,000 people each day, or 2,000 tests per day. Have we met this goal? Yes.
Goal 5: A positive rate of PCR tests below 5%, indicating that we’re doing enough testing to get a good handle on how widespread the virus is. Have we met this goal? Yes, but the number is edging up.
An average of 9,000 PCR tests are being conducted each day in New Hampshire.
A worrisome point is that the percentage of tests that are positive has gone from about 1% in August to almost 4% this month.
That’s not a bad number, but the trend is going in the wrong direction.
(David Brooks can be reached at 369-3313 or dbrooks@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @GraniteGeek.)
