COVID hospitalizations in Galveston County are at a 2-year low

In the next week, the number of cases would double, and then double again two weeks later. On any given day over the next two years, there would be at least 10 people diagnosed with COVID being treated in a county hospital, according to publicly reported numbers.

That changed this week.

On Thursday afternoon, there were only five patients diagnosed with COVID-19 in county hospitals, according to the Southeast Texas Regional Advisory Council. Only one person with COVID-19 was reported to be in a local intensive care unit.

On Monday, there were just four local COVID hospitalizations.

Over the past week, there has been an average of just six people a day in local hospitals and diagnosed with COVID-19.

The reported numbers are the lowest since the final week of March 2020, a time when the city of Galveston had ordered beaches closed, the county and state had issued stay-at-home orders and advisories and people around the county were adjusting to life in isolation.

“The numbers are extraordinarily low,” said Dr. Philip Keiser, Galveston County’s local health authority and the CEO of the Galveston County Health District.

Hospitals in the county feel “pre-COVID normal,” Keiser said.

The drop in hospitalizations followed the steep decline in new cases as the omicron wave began to burn out across the county and the rest of the United States.

On Friday, the health district announced it had received reports of 92 new COVID-19 cases over the past week, an average of 13 a day. During the peak of the omicron surge, new cases would number 600 or more.

The surge began passing in late January. On Friday, the health district reported just 728 active COVID-19 cases in the county, the lowest total since July 2021.

“I really think it shows where we are right now,” Keiser said. “The numbers are extraordinarily low. We’re following the same trajectory that South Africa has.”

About half the cases appearing in the county are a variant called BA.2 that experts have said is highly infectious and led to a surge in cases in Europe. Some health officials don’t expect the variant to cause serious widespread illness because of its similarity to the omicron variant.

Keiser was hopeful that is the case.

“I’m just keeping my fingers crossed and hoping that there are enough people out there with immunity from getting their vaccine or getting omicron that we can go through the transition without a lot of cases,” Keiser said.

Compared to the initial surge of two years ago, there now are few, if any, public mandates or precautions in place meant to slow the spread of COVID-19 and remaining rules appear to be loosening by the day. This week, for instance, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lowered its advisory cautioning people from traveling on cruise ships because of the threat of spread of the virus on board.

One precaution is still in place: Galveston County’s COVID-19 disaster declaration. County commissioners renewed the declaration last week. The county had committed to keeping a COVID-19 testing program for uninsured people in place into the the summer and the declaration allows it to maintain a contract with the University of Texas Medical Branch for that service.

The BA.2 variant is a reminder there are still some reasons to be cautious even with the latest dip in cases, Keiser said. In 2020 and 2021, COVID cases dropped in the spring before rising again in June and July as new variants of the virus appeared.

Keiser encouraged people to get COVID booster shots if they haven’t gotten one already. This week, the CDC said people older than 50 and the immunocompromised should get a fourth booster shot.

For the first time, Keiser said he was thinking about the possibility of when Galveston County might be declared COVID-free. The standard for such a declaration would be for no new cases to be identified for 21 consecutive days.