Palm Beach County is experiencing another big summer surge of COVID-19 infections, the latest sewage data shows, and it's unclear how harsh or deadly it is because of lack of data reporting.
Coronavirus counts in northern Palm Beach County sewage more than quadrupled between the beginning of June and July 1, the latest testing from the Jupiter-area Loxahatchee River District shows. Samples tested July 1 had about 293 viral particles per milligram of sewage, up from about 62 per milligram June 3. The WastewaterSCAN initiative conducted those tests.
Testing from another laboratory, Biobot Analytics, confirm COVID's spread in county sewage. It found 856 coronavirus particles per milliliter of wastewater in samples collected July 1, up from 388 per milliliter June 3.
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How severe are recent COVID infections? Why we don't know
Viral counts haven't been this high since this past winter or last summer. But if infections countywide and statewide are more severe compared with previous waves, residents have no way of knowing from government health agencies that once provided daily or weekly data.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in May dropped its requirement that hospitals nationwide report COVID-positive patient counts, emergency room COVID admissions and other data regularly to the federal health agency.
The state-run Palm Beach County Department of Health did not respond as of Wednesday afternoon to a request for hospitalization information in the county.
Google searches: The most COVID concern is in the Treasure Coast, Palm Beach County
Wellington Regional Medical Center infectious disease specialist Dr. Larry Bush said most COVID patients he has seen have been elderly, with underlying heart or lung diseases, but don't have severe infections like people did a year or two ago.
"I haven't had anyone on a ventilator in awhile," he said. "I'm certainly not seeing anyone who is healthy winding up with severe disease in quite awhile."
Even with lack of official data, Google search statistics reveal that Palm Beach County and Treasure Coast residents are the Floridians who are most concerned about the disease. Searches for the phrase "covid symptoms" doubled between June 26 and Tuesday in the Palm Beach County to Fort Pierce area, Google data shows. Google does not report the number of searches, but shows that number relative to June 26.
In Florida, the phrase "covid symptoms" is searched in Google the most in the Palm Beach County-Treasure Coast region, the search engine's data shows.
The newest COVID vaccines will be available in the fall. Availability dates have not been announced for the Moderna, Pfizer or Novavax shots. The CDC recommended on June 27 that everyone ages 6 months or older get the shots. The vaccines will be available once again in pharmacies across Palm Beach County, Florida and the nation.
Anyone whose health insurance plan does not fully cover the cost of immunization can still get a shot for free through the federal government's Bridge Access Program. Go online to Vaccines.gov, click or tap the "Find COVID-19 Vaccines" button, select the shots you seek, enter your ZIP code, click or tap the "search" button and on the list of vaccine locations, tick the "Bridge Access Program" checkbox. The program ends in August.
The CDC recommends that anyone infected by COVID stay home and away from others until at least 24 hours after both their symptoms are getting better and, if they are not taking fever-inducing medicine, they have had no fever.
Chris Persaud is a reporter at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach him at cpersaud@pbpost.com.
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