Springfield well being leaders clarify new COVID-19 variant; the way it may influence neighborhood

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) – There are new considerations over a COVID-19 variant spreading in China and the UK.

CoxHealth’s inner medication hospitalist Dr. Sarah Smitherman says the Omicron variant has two sorts. BA1 is what we noticed in the neighborhood a number of months in the past. BA2 is what’s turning into distinguished in different international locations world wide.

”As we all know with COVID it might probably proceed to vary and the way it impacts one inhabitants doesn’t essentially imply it’s going to have an effect on our inhabitants the identical,” Dr. Smitherman says. “However we’re watching it and we’ll be ready if it does come this manner.”

Dr. Smitherman says though there’s concern over elevated severity with this variant, there isn’t sufficient information to again that up.

Dr. Smitherman says that makes it exhausting to foretell when it may hit southwest Missouri or how dangerous it could possibly be.

“I don’t know with certainty {that a} new variant will hit Springfield, Missouri but it surely’s actually a chance,” Dr. Smitherman says. “We’ve seen these waves and it’s cheap to assume these waves can be ongoing however one factor we now have is data. We’ve acquired two years of data on the best way to put together and workers and look after sufferers.”

The Springfield-Greene County Well being Division is reporting the seven day every day common as 15 circumstances. The bottom in 2021 was 16. Regardless of the hopes for continued low numbers, Aaron Schekorra with the Springfield-Greene County Well being Division says they’ve discovered from earlier surges and are ready for what may come subsequent.

“The flexibility to have this lull, to have these decrease case numbers, to look again on how we responded, what occurred all through our neighborhood throughout these circumstances, having this time to look again and replicate and make these changes is admittedly priceless,” Schekorra says.

Schekorra says vaccination is a key means for folks to guard themselves shifting ahead. That’s why the well being division is urging folks not solely to get their preliminary doses but in addition the booster.

“We don’t know what’s to come back,” Schekorra says. “We don’t know if one other variant have been to develop if it’s gonna have these extra extreme outcomes just like the delta variant or be extra transmissible just like the omicron. Since we will’t actually say what’s coming down the pipeline, we need to make the most of these instruments that we now have out there to us.”

The well being division is providing further COVID-19 testing choices subsequent week so folks can get examined after any spring break journey. A testing website can be being supplied on Tuesday, March 22 for college students from any of the native schools. It’s being held on the Plaster Pupil Union on Missouri State College’s campus from 12:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.

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