CT COVID-19 Rate Spikes To Highest Level In 10 Months; Town-By-Town Case Updates

CONNECTICUT — The state Department of Public Health is reporting the highest coronavirus positivity rate in Connecticut since January.

The data released Tuesday afternoon show the rate has climbed to 5.96 percent, an infection level not seen since Jan. 24.

The spike in positivity comes upstream of any official word on how deeply omicron, the latest coronavirus variant, may have traveled into the U.S., if it all. Federal health officials do not expect to have any of that data until the end of next week.

Omicron was just was first reported to the World Health Organization on Wednesday by South African health officials after identifying a case there. Since then, cases have been reported in Belgium, Israel, Hong Kong and Britain, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In an interview with the Financial Times published Tuesday, Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel predicted it could be months before his industry could step up production sufficiently to get ahead of the latest variant.

"I think it’s going to be a material drop," Bancel said. "I just don’t know how much because we need to wait for the data." The drugmaker's remarks are widely credited with Tuesday's stock mark slump.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell pulled no punches in front of Congress Tuesday, warning that "the recent rise in COVID-19 cases and the emergence of the omicron variant pose downside risks to employment and economic activity and increased uncertainty for inflation."

Both WHO and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said vaccines are critical to reducing severe symptoms and death, and the current vaccines being used will protect people against the omicron variant. The CDC recommends that all children age 5 and up and all adults be vaccinated.

WHO said omicron (variant B.1.1.529) "has several mutations that may have an impact on how it behaves, for example, on how easily it spreads or the severity of illness it causes."

The agency has not been able to determine whether omicron is more easily spread from person to person than other variants, including delta. Nor is the severity of omicron known, said WHO.

Gov. Ned Lamont released a statement over the weekend touting the state's foresight in establishing a network of labs to conduct genomic sequencing on positive test specimens to provide understanding of the variants circulating in Connecticut.

"Our advance planning in this area will help us track Omicron, in addition to other variants that could appear in the future," Lamont said.

As of Tuesday afternoon, just under 72 percent of Connecticut's population has been fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Hospitalizations in the state rose by 11 beds overnight. Three hundred sixty-five patients are currently hospitalized with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19; of those 92 (25.2 percent) are fully vaccinated.

Most of those hospitalized (108) are in Hartford County.

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