Axios COVID-19 cases are trending up in Colorado and nationwide.
A summer uptick isn’t unusual. But the latest surge is colliding with back-to-school season, when the virus could spread even more.
- The surge comes after Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. unilaterally changed federal COVID vaccine recommendations, causing confusion over who should get the shots.
Driving the news: Wastewater data for the week ending Aug. 2 shows the Western U.S. leading the nation in COVID levels, with peaks in Colorado, Alaska, California, Nevada and Utah, per the CDC.
- In Colorado, COVID emergency department visits and positive tests are rising, state health department spokesperson Hope Shuler tells Axios Denver.
- CDC data shows the state’s positivity rate sits at 8% — lower than the 12% seen in New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana — but still trending upward. Hospitalizations haven’t spiked yet.
What they’re saying: “We know that wastewater results and test positivity can be early indicators of increasing COVID-19 illness in a community,” Shuler warns.
“As people move indoors and are closer to each other,” she notes, “it is possible we will see more illness.”