BUFFALO (WBEN) - Despite the record number of COVID vaccinations being administered nationally, a recent steady uptick in COVID cases is cause for concern that the pandemic is nowhere nearing an end yet.
"The reality we're facing is we had a very nice and steady decrease after the Christmas and New Years holidays that lasted for a couple of months," said Dr. Tom Russo, Chief of Infectious Disease at the Jacobs School of Medicine. "But over the last three weeks, we've had a real reverse in that course."
Health officials in Western New York are expressing concern over what appears to be yet another wave of COVID-19 in the region.
Hospitalizations have more than doubled since March 20, rising every week for several weeks.
In fact, according the the state's dashboard tool, there were 301 COVID hospitalizations as of April 9, which well exceeds the peak in hospitalizations (263) the region saw last April.
"This has likely been due to a combination of COVID fatigue, a laxity in people following the public health measures we know that work, a loosening of restrictions where now people are doing more things indoors without masks...," said Dr. Tom Russo, Chief of Infectious Disease at the Jacobs School of Medicine.
County Executive Mark Poloncarz noted there were 241 COVID-19 cases in Erie County hospitals on April 7, and the hospitals reported to the Erie County Department of Health that not a single patient had been fully vaccinated.
Dr. Joseph Chow is the President and Chief Medical Officer for Western New York Urgent Care, and he expressed a silver lining in the uptick in cases - the fact that this wave is affecting more young people, it's a good sign that the vaccine is effective.
"This seems to be affecting more of the younger populations - the teens and up to the 20's, 30's and 40's," Chow began. "Vaccines have been rolling out...and it is protecting people who are getting the vaccines, looking at our older population, and that's why we're actually seeing the patients that are getting infected tend to be the other age group, the younger age group."
While Russo is concerned about the rising case numbers and hospitalizations, he's also "comfortable" that the region has the ability to temper the virus once again.
"We still have a significant portion of our population that has no protection against this virus, until they get vaccinated," said Russo. "Everyone wants to be done with this pandemic - we're not done yet."
"We just have to hang on for another one to two months until we get critical shots in arms to really stuff this virus," he continued. "We're getting there, but we're not there yet."
