COVID-19 rates in the Southwestern United States reached 12.5% \u2014 the highest in the nation \u2014 according to new data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released this week. Meanwhile, Los Angeles County recorded the highest COVID levels in its wastewater since February.<\/p>\n
The spike, thanks to the new highly contagious \u201cStratus\u201d variant, comes as students across California return to the classroom, now without a CDC recommendation that they receive updated COVID shots. That change in policy, pushed by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has been criticized by many public health experts. <\/p>\n
The COVID-19 virus, SARS-CoV-2, mutates often, learning to better transmit itself from person to person and evade immunity created by vaccinations and previous infections.<\/p>\n
The Stratus variant, first detected in Asia in January, reached the U.S. in March and became the predominant strain by the end of June. It now accounts for two-thirds of virus variants detected in wastewater in the U.S., according to the CDC<\/a>. <\/p>\n The nationwide COVID positivity rate hit 9% in early August, surpassing the January post-holiday surge, but still below last August\u2019s spike to 18%. Weekly deaths, a metric that lags behind positivity rates, has so far remained low.<\/p>\n In May, RFK Jr. announced<\/a> the CDC had removed the COVID vaccine from its recommended immunization schedule for healthy children and healthy pregnant women.<\/p>\n The secretary argued it was the right move to reverse the Biden administration\u2019s policy, which in 2024, \u201curged healthy children to get yet another COVID shot, despite the lack of any clinical data to support the repeat booster strategy in children.\u201d<\/p>\n That statement promptly spurred a lawsuit<\/a> from a group of leading medical organizations \u2014 including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Physicians and the American Public Health Assn. \u2014 which argued the \u201cbaseless and uninformed\u201d decision violated federal law by failing to ground the policy on the recommendation of the scientific committee that looks at immunization practices in the U.S.<\/p>\n The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices has been routinely recommending<\/a> updated COVID vaccinations alongside the typical yearly flu vaccination schedule. In its update for the fall 2024-spring 2025 season<\/a>, it noted that in the previous year, a COVID booster decreased the risk of hospitalization by 44% and death by 23%.<\/p>\n The panel argued the benefit outweighed isolated cases of heart conditions and allergic reactions associated with the vaccine.<\/p>\n The panel also acknowledged that booster effectiveness decreases as new COVID strains \u2014 for which the boosters were not designed \u2014 emerge. Nevertheless, it still felt that most Americans should get booster shots. <\/p>\n