Alabama as a whole is now classified as being at high risk of COVID transmission as cases skyrocket just days before Christmas.

On Thursday, 2,060 new COVID cases were reported, giving the state a 1,173 7-day average for new cases, more than triple the daily average at the start of the month.

The omicron variant has spurred COVID increases across the country. The variant is far more infectious than earlier strains but tends to cause milder illness, though it still can be extremely dangerous, particularly for people with other health conditions, and still carries the risk of inflicting sufferers with long COVID. Read more.

The explosive growth of the highly infectious omicron variant and a rapid rise in COVID cases since Thanksgiving prompted several officials and physicians to raise the red flag Tuesday.

Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin and Jefferson County Health Officer Mark E. Wilson suggested that a new surge in cases could overwhelm local hospitals and urged people to get vaccinated.

Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at UAB, said the spread of omicron is now being compared to the measles, one of the most infectious agents known to man.

Other news on the COVID front:
Jefferson County is now classified as having a high rate of community transmission.
Vaccines not as effective against omicron and monoclonal antibodies ineffective.
Preventive measures urged.
Recommendations for holiday travel.
Marrazzo: “This virus is just weird. It’s a weird virus that has been unpredictable and has done things that we haven’t seen with other respiratory viruses. So I’d just really respect it.”
Read more.

Christmastime is here, and now the omicron variant of COVID-19 is as well.

The Alabama Department of Public Health announced Thursday that the fast-spreading variant, first reported in November in southern parts of Africa, has been found in a patient in Alabama.

The ADPH was vague on details because of federal privacy laws but did say that the infected person was tested after noticing symptoms earlier in December. The resident had not traveled outside the state recently and lives somewhere in the West Central Public Health District — an area that includes Tuscaloosa, Bibb, Walker, Lamar, Fayette, Pickens, Sumter, Greene, Hale, Perry and Chilton counties.

Omicron arrives as COVID numbers in the state already have started to rise. Alabama and Jefferson County both were on the cusp of dropping into the ‘low’ category for community transmission just a month ago. Now both are listed in the substantial transmission category, the third-highest of four risk levels.

Under health department recommendations, the change means that everyone, even those who are fully vaccinated, are advised to wear masks in public indoor settings. Health officials also have stepped up their efforts to encourage those who are not vaccinated to get a vaccine. Read more.

Omicron has still not made an appearance in Alabama — yet. But the delta variant of the COVID virus is going strong, and new cases are increasing after a three-month downtrend.

In BirminghamWatch’s periodic analysis of the spread of COVID through Alabama, the number of daily new cases has nearly doubled over the past 10 days, and hospitalizations also have ticked upward, though not by much.

The increases have moved Alabama back into the substantial risk category, the highest of four categories used to classify community transmission of COVID, according to information from the Alabama Department of Public Health. The virus had backed off enough that the state was almost into the low risk category one month ago. Read more.

There’s a lot more we don’t know about the new omicron variant of COVID-19 than what we do know.

Dr. Suzanne Judd, a professor and epidemiologist at the UAB School of Public Health, told reporters in a Tuesday morning online conference that the variant first discovered in South Africa is spreading rapidly in that region, but there are many unanswered questions about how severe the symptoms might be for those infected.

“The truth of it is, we just don’t know enough about it. We have things that we think about the omicron variant based on what is coming out of South Africa,” Judd said. “We think it spreads more rapidly than delta. This is based on the fact that South Africa is having a huge surge in cases of COVID, despite the fact that they already battled a delta wave almost at the same time that Alabama (did).

“We think it may be less virulent, which means it may be less severe, less likely to put people in the hospital, but still spreading quite rapidly.” Read more.

As health officials worldwide cast a wary eye on the newly discovered omicron variant of the COVID-19 virus, the delta strain continues to account for the vast majority of new cases in Alabama.

In BirminghamWatch’s periodic analysis of the spread of COVID throughout the state, the number of daily new cases has risen from reports covering the Thanksgiving holiday period. However, the amount of fluctuation in the numbers caused by health agency staffers taking time off during that period is unclear.

The 7-day moving average of new COVID cases stands at 352.86 per day as of Thursday. That’s up from 283 on Tuesday, the lowest level the average has seen since July 7, but it also is down by 21% from the average of 444.43 a week before. The average has been in a steady decline since Sept. 1, when the pandemic all-time record of 5,538 cases per day was set at the height of the delta-variant surge. Read more.

While COVID-19 infection numbers have turned downward over the past couple of months, there are multiple symptoms of the virus that are causing problems over extended periods of time.

Health officials are just starting to get a handle on how extensive the problem, appropriately called “long COVID,” is and what the longstanding effects are.

Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, director of UAB Medicine’s Division of Infectious Diseases, said more research is being done to try to pin down what causes some COVID patients to suffer symptoms for months at a time. Loss of the senses of taste or smell are probably the best-known symptoms affecting those who were not hospitalized for COVID, but the range of symptoms is much wider than that for both those who were hospitalized or not.

“It became pretty clear after the first wave, last spring, starting in the Northeast and in Europe, that there was a significant subset of people who really took a long time to get better from COVID, didn’t get better, or got better but had relapses of some very distinct symptom complexes,” Marrazzo said. Read more.