Health officials in Butte County say the most recent surge of coronavirus cases is leading to more hospitalizations.
They’re also considering shifts in their emergency response to COVID-19 in the months ahead.
Ninety-one COVID-19 patients were hospitalized on Sunday. That was up from 88 on Saturday and 76 on Friday.
Public Health Director Danette York told the Board of Supervisors Tuesday that the county saw an increase in COVID-19 cases due to the omicron variant about two weeks ago.
“We did anticipate this,” York said. “As I’ve mentioned in the past, hospitalizations follow about two weeks behind the number of cases.”
York added that seven of Butte County’s nine skilled nursing facilities are experiencing outbreaks.
She said the omicron variant is also ushering in changes to the county’s COVID-19 response over the next few months.
Case investigation and contact tracing efforts are shifting their focus to large outbreaks and high-risk settings, such as nursing homes and homeless shelters.
The county will remove its online portal where people could report the results of their at-home tests because of staff time considerations and a lack of “good data,” York said, adding that most people are likely not reporting their results.
The county also intends to reduce the number of times per week it updates its COVID-19 dashboard in part because daily case numbers and other data don’t accurately capture the state of the virus, she said.
“It’s anticipated that sometime — hopefully — in the near future COVID will be treated similarly to other communicable diseases,” York said. “And other communicable diseases do not get reported using a dashboard.”
The public health director said most changes are expected to be in place by March.
