With Thanksgiving and the start of the holiday season two weeks away, coronavirus cases are on the rise again in Illinois, even as health officials push to get vaccines into the arms of young children and other unvaccinated residents and those who now qualify for booster shots.
Another 5,044 new confirmed and probable COVID-19 cases were reported by state health officials Wednesday, the most in a single day since Sept. 10. Over the past week, the state has averaged 3,122 cases per day, a 41% increase from the previous week and the highest level since late September, when the late-summer surge driven by the highly contagious delta variant was subsiding.
Just three weeks ago, Gov. J.B. Pritzker, encouraged by declining cases and hospitalizations, raised the possibility of lifting “certain mask mandates” in time for the holidays. But last week, noting that a drop in hospitalizations for COVID-19 had stalled, Pritzker said it was “not a good sign.”
Now, both cases and hospitalizations are rising as the weather turns cold and people spend more time indoors, bringing reminders of the state’s worst surge last fall.
“This recent increase could mark the beginning of yet another wave,” Illinois Department of Public Health spokeswoman Melaney Arnold said in a statement Wednesday.
“Our health partners have indicated that more people are moving indoors because of the cooler weather, but they are not bringing their masks with them,” Arnold said, noting that the same conditions fueled the surge late last year.
Along with the rise in cases, the average number of patients in hospitals statewide with COVID-19 is up 6.5% over the past week, reaching 1,332 per day during the week ending Tuesday, up from 1,251 per day the prior week.
Testing requirements in schools and workplaces have led to a substantial increase in the number of people being checked for COVID-19 in recent months. But the rise in cases has been accompanied by increases in the coronavirus positivity rate, which suggests the increase isn’t just a function of more people being screened for the virus. The statewide case positivity — the share of new cases as a percentage of total test — reached a seven-day average of 2.5% for the week ending Tuesday after dropping below 2% late last month.
A Tribune analysis of state health department data shows the spike in the average number of daily cases is part of a broader, two-week rise in detected infections.
The state breaks Illinois into 11 health regions, and the rise in new cases can be seen across the state. But it can be found most notably in the North region, which is basically northern Illinois west of the greater Chicago area.
Unlike some other regions outside Chicago, the North region wasn’t hit hard during the most recent surge, topping out around 30 new cases detected a day per 100,000 residents. But now its rate has topped 40 a day.
A close second is Illinois’ East-Central region, approaching 40 a day. The rates in Chicago and its suburbs, while rising, remain far lower, with rates ranging from 18 a day in Chicago to 28 per day in the region encompassing Will and Kankakee counties.
The rise in new cases detected has fed an increase over the past two weeks in the average number of Illinoisans hospitalized for COVID-19 each day.
While still far below the record high of more than 6,100 nearly a year ago, the latest figure — 1,332 — is about 100 more than the average on Oct. 30. Pritzker
has cited trends in hospitalization figures as what’s kept him from lifting his indoor mask mandate.
Jaline Gerardin, a Northwestern University assistant professor of preventive medicine who works on virus modeling, said Illinois’ rising numbers are part of an increase being seeing in neighboring states as well.
“Everyone seems to be ticking up,” she said.
Despite the high levels of infection nationwide, Illinois is one of only a half-dozen states, along with Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., that require masks in indoor public places, regardless of vaccination status.
When issuing the statewide mandate in late August, Pritzker cited guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that urge universal masking in areas of “substantial or high” coronavirus transmission. That still covers nearly all 102 counties in Illinois.
Unlike earlier stages in the pandemic, Pritzker hasn’t laid out specific bench marks for when he’ll lift the mask mandate, which — aside from targeted vaccination requirements for certain state employees and workers in other industries — is the main state mandate in place right now to slow the spread.
“We will continue to monitor hospital bed availability, case rates, and vaccine uptake,” Arnold said. “If data shows things might be stabilizing, we can look at lifting the requirement to wear a mask — something that adds a layer of protection on top of vaccination. The entire purpose of masking is to protect people, not penalize them.”
State surveys have shown that Pritzker’s first mask mandate was consistently followed less in rural areas compared with suburban and urban locales. That has raised questions about how effective mask requirements can be in reducing the spread in all areas of the state, particularly less vaccinated ones.
The state continues to partner with churches, community groups and other organizations to set up vaccination clinics those who have not yet received a shot, Arnold said. That includes close to 30% of Illinois residents 12 and older.
“It is possible the rates will drop again if people apply mitigation efforts: get vaccinated (including boosting), wash their hands, wear their masks, socially distance,” she said.
The widespread availability of vaccines, despite pockets of strong resistance, is a crucial difference from this time last year, when Illinois suffered its worst, deadliest surge. Hospitalizations in 2020 had generally been mild all summer before starting to rise in late September.
This latest rise in cases and hospitalizations didn’t begin until October, and this month’s rise follows two smaller surges. Those last surges illustrated the power of vaccinations to limit how many people get seriously ill from the virus.
The most recent week’s worth of data shows the unvaccinated were 3 ½ times as likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19 as those fully vaccinated.
But the latest data also reconfirms that the vaccinated remain at some risk, particularly with studies showing vaccine immunity lessening over time.
That’s why health authorities have
recommended booster shots for anyone who took the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine, as well Pfizer and Moderna shot-takers who are 65 or older, or those at higher risk because of their medical conditions or jobs. Pfizer is
now asking regulators to allow all adults to get boosters.
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