New Years risk? San Jose experiencing 3rd highest COVID wave ever right now, wastewater shows

As the countdown to 2024 approaches, Dwayne Taylor — the founder of San Jose events company Taylor Productions — is preparing to celebrate. For nearly a decade, he has hosted one of the city’s largest New Year’s parties. And for the first time since 2020, COVID-19 is finally feeling like less of an obstacle.

“I’ve had it three times, and I’ve also had a lot of really close friends who passed away from COVID,” said Taylor, who suspended the parties in 2020 and 2021 before bringing it back last year. “So if I thought for a second that this party would be a problem or a spreader event, I would have canceled it in a heartbeat.”

Despite the persistent presence of COVID-19 and an ongoing surge — hospitalizations are up, and so is the virus’ presence in wastewater — Taylor is among many Bay Area residents making the same calculus.

Most are throwing masks and other precautions to the winds, and it’s not just revelers. Nearly four years after the pandemic’s onset, state- and county-level health warnings are less frequent and more tempered than they’ve ever been, mostly reminding people to get vaccinated, and to stay home when sick.

“I’ve been struggling in terms of communicating to the public that there’s a lot of virus out there, there’s a high chance of getting sick if you don’t take precautions … but at the same time, things are a lot better,” said John Swartzberg, a clinical professor emeritus of infectious diseases and vaccinology at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health.

Across the Bay Area, regions are seeing “high” levels of COVID-19 in their wastewater, including San Leandro, Central Contra Costa, Oakland, San Francisco, and Redwood City, according to the WastewasterSCAN dashboard, a national dataset based at Stanford University.

San Jose is experiencing a particularly dramatic surge, with wastewater data showing COVID-19 at a level only seen during the two worst waves of the pandemic. Concentration levels are also higher than they were during the first winter wave in January 2021, when hospitals canceled non-emergency surgeries and procedures to ward off a continued spread.

So why aren’t people worried? Unlike the early days of the pandemic, when contracting COVID was deadly business for the elderly and immunocompromised, and risky for everyone else, new infections less frequently equate to hospitalizations and death. Readily available vaccines have usually rendered cases milder, and therapeutics such as Paxlovid can reduce the severity of symptoms.

Even so, the level of hospitalizations this year is not insignificant, and is much higher than people heading to the emergency room with the flu.

Despite the reduced risk, COVID is still deadly, contributing to over 1,000 deaths in California since October 1. Between December 10-16, 2,800 people were hospitalized for COVID across the state, and just over 1,000 for the flu.

Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, an infectious disease doctor at the University of California San Francisco, said there were 27 COVID patients at his hospital on Wednesday — including two in the intensive care unit. That’s compared to 15 patients two weeks ago. Most of those in the hospital, he said, are above age 75 and unvaccinated.

“It’s easier to catch because (the new variant) is more transmissible. That’s why it seems that everybody and their neighbor has COVID right now,” said Chin-Hong.

While hospitalizations are up statewide and nationally, they are nowhere near the heights during the virus’ early surges. Hospitalized COVID patients peaked at 146,000 in late January 2022, down to just 20,000 in mid-December 2023. In California, current hospitalizations are around 1,900, just a fraction of the over 22,000 people hospitalized during the state’s peak in January 2021.

There’s also the risk of catching other respiratory viruses, like RSV and the flu, Chin-Hong said.

Still, for some New Year’s Eve celebrants — especially those who are young and healthy — navigating COVID-19 seems to have faded to the background of daily life.

“Some people still wear masks at some of our events, but it’s nothing like it was a few years ago,” said Tony Orella, general manager of Roccapulco, who is planning a 600-person New Year’s Eve celebration in the San Francisco club this Sunday. “Though cases are going back up, it’s just the season.”

Like the few still masking at Orella’s parties, many Bay Area residents are still looking for ways to reduce their risk of getting sick, despite venturing out. For those, Swartzberg has some advice: “If you’re having a party, part of the invitation should include a statement saying, ‘Please do not come if you have any kind of symptoms.’”

Swartzberg understands most people don’t want to wear a mask at a party, but “if it’s possible, keep the windows open so you have some cross ventilation,” he said. And put those air filters to use, even outside of fire season. Chin-Hong also said that anyone who hadn’t been boosted — or gotten COVID directly — this fall should get vaccinated with the latest shot as soon as possible.

“You’ve got this one-two-three punch of Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s, and people coming together with lots of things flying around,” said Chin-Hong. “(Rates) will likely go up again after New Year’s.”

On top of that, acute illness isn’t the only thing to worry about, Swartzberg said. For some people, the lingering effects of an infection can be debilitating.

“Be sure to throw into your calculus the issue of long-COVID,” he said.