COVID-19 Status in Sedgwick County – August 2023

Recent countywide data shows an increase in new cases of COVID-19 in the past few weeks. For the week of June 4, there were 7 new cases reported to the Health Department; for the week of August 20, there were 68. There has also been an increase in clusters in the past two weeks.

Emergency department data shows a slight increase in COVID-19-related visits (0.3%), although this is still much lower than at this time in 2022 (5.8%). COVID-19 hospitalizations are 2.5 per 100,000 residents, but hospitalizations are still low per the CDC’s COVID-19 Hospital Admission Level.

The currently dominant strain of COVID-19 in the United States is EG.5. According to Yale Medicine, the EG.5 strain traces its lineage to the Omicron variant which began circulating in November 2021. So far, it has not been shown to cause more severe symptoms, but it has a mutation that could render current immunity from vaccines or previous infection less effective. However, the updated vaccines expected later this fall should remain somewhat effective against the newer strains¹.

^1. https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/covid-eg5-eris-latest-coronavirus-strain