Why one doctor is 'very worried' about COVID-19 heading into winter
By
Lauren Fox, AccuWeather staff writer
Published Oct 8, 2021 1:43 PM EST
|
Updated Oct 8, 2021 1:43 PM EST
Three kids wearing anti-virus masks. (lmgorthand/iStock/Getty Images)
It's a tale as old as time: As temperatures drop, people get sick.
Scientists have long known that common cold and flu cases climb during the colder months of the year, but there were a lot of unknowns in how changes in weather would influence the spread of COVID-19 as it turned cooler in 2020. But recent research from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Louisville has revealed that there are notable trends in how the coronavirus spreads in colder weather -- and the findings are troubling to researchers as the United States heads deeper into autumn and then winter.
"I'm actually quite worried," Adam Kaplin, an adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and author of the study, told AccuWeather. "As the temperature gets colder, the rate of transmission goes up for this virus."
The study, which was published in the journal PLOS ONE back in February, revealed that lower daily temperatures correlated with higher rates of transmission for the COVID-19 virus in 50 different countries across the Northern Hemisphere.
The data came from an earlier period of the COVID-19 pandemic when lockdowns and prevention methods were less prevalent, therefore less likely to influence the results of the study. The study was also conducted prior to the emergence of the delta variant.
Many respiratory illnesses, like influenza, tend to be temperature sensitive. The study showed that COVID-19's behavior is consistent with other seasonal respiratory viruses.
"I'm actually quite worried. As the temperature gets colder, the rate of transmission goes up for this virus."
--Study co-author Adam Kaplin
According to Kaplin, the research revealed that from the beginning of October to the end of December in 2020, the latitude of a city correlated to its rate of increase of COVID-19 cases. Cities situated at a higher latitude (colder cities) had higher rates of increase of COVID-19 cases than lower-latitude cities, which in general have a warmer climate. This finding supports the observation that the spread of the coronavirus is temperature-sensitive, according to researchers.
“Although COVID-19 is an infectious disease that will have non-temperature dependent transmission, our research indicates that it also may have a seasonal component," Aruni Bhatnagar, co-author of the study and director of the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute at the University of Louisville, told Health Europe. "Of course, the effect of temperature on the rate of transmission is altered by social interventions like distancing, as well as time spent indoors and other factors. A combination of these factors ultimately determines the spread of COVID-19.”
Many studies point to the reason for increased virus spread in the winter to be more related to behavior and how people stay inside more often due to the cold, but Kaplin explained that the viability of the virus plays a large role in whether or not it takes off during the winter.
While it may seem straightforward that colder weather correlates with increased transmission of respiratory viruses, he explained that other variables come into play that could make or break the winter season for virus spread. "Social interventions," as he described them, such as social distancing, mask-wearing and vaccination, can put the spread of the virus in a sort of "plateau" state and prevent the spread from taking off and becoming unmanageable.
At the beginning of October, Alaska had the highest risk of infection due to the rate of new cases per capita with 157 new cases on average per 100,000 residents, according to data from NPR. Over a two-week period beginning in late September, the state saw a 55% increase in new cases and at one point was reporting on average 1,146 new cases each day.
From mid-September through early October, the state experienced cooler-than-average weather in general, AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alan Reppert said, particularly in Anchorage and Fairbanks -- the two most populated cities in the state. Meanwhile, Juneau and Barrow recorded temperatures that were around average during that timeframe, which ranges between 40 and 60 degrees Fahrenheit to start mid-September and between 30 and 50 F in early October.
An image of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, under a microscope. (NIH)
As of Oct. 1, 50.8% of the state's population had been fully vaccinated, compared to 55.9% of the total U.S. population at that point. Following Alaska, the states with the highest risk of infection based on new cases per capita were Wyoming, North Dakota and Montana.
"I am very worried about what's going to happen as the temperature drops, especially because what we're seeing now is an upswing, it's only going to get amplified," Kaplin told AccuWeather. "It's gonna be what we're experiencing now, which is bad, on steroids."
In addition to cold weather causing a potential spike in cases, seasonal allergies that strike in the fall could complicate the matter further, as some symptoms of COVID-19 are very similar to allergy symptoms.
"If you talk to people in the very beginning [of the pandemic], they'll tell you their COVID, they thought it was allergies because they had a runny nose," Dr. Murray Ramanathan, director of Johns Hopkins University Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery in the Greater Washington Area and Associate Professor of Otolaryngology, told AccuWeather.
A fever was previously a tell-tale sign of a person's symptoms being caused by COVID-19 rather than allergies; however, Ramanathan told AccuWeather that people who are vaccinated against the virus and catching the delta variant of the virus aren't experiencing fevers as often.
Without that tell-tale signal of a virus, other symptoms can be even more confusing, but Ramanathan said itchiness of the eyes, nose and throat can be signals that a person's symptoms are indicators of allergies.
"I think it's the trajectory of symptoms that probably matters more than the actual symptoms you have," he explained. Allergy symptoms can "wax and wane," he said, as days go on and a person takes allergy medication. COVID symptoms are unlikely to wax and wane, rather they are likely to get progressively worse if they go untreated.
According to Ramanathan, the common cold is more prevalent this time of year than COVID. "I think that that can be a little bit more difficult to distinguish a difference, because you can feel pretty awful," he explained.
Social interventions are not only effective in battling the COVID-19 pandemic. Last winter, flu activity in the U.S. reached historically low levels, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). "We’re looking very hard for flu," Lynette Brammer, who leads the domestic influenza team for the CDC, told AccuWeather in February. "We’re just not finding it." The historically low flu activity was attributed to social distancing, mask-wearing and other restrictions designed to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
According to a report from the CDC, which stated that both the U.S. and countries in the Southern Hemisphere were experiencing low influenza numbers, a 98% decrease in influenza activity was reported among samples that were tested, and a 61% decrease was found in samples submitted for testing in the first place.
"It's an indicator that's telling us how well the masks work in trying to stop the transmission," Kaplin said. "Last year, enough people I think were worried enough, and there wasn't quite the hype about not wearing masks, that people were masking up."
FILE - In this Dec. 21, 2020, file photo, Michelle Chester, director of employee health services at Northwell Health, prepares the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at Northwell Health's Long Island Jewish Valley Stream hospital in Valley Stream, N.Y. Hospitals and nursing homes across the country are preparing for worsening staff shortages as state deadlines arrive for employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19. New York health care employees had until the end of the day Monday, Sept. 27, 2021, to get at least one dose. (Eduardo Munoz/Pool Photo via AP, File)
He said vaccinating the population, along with other mitigation efforts, is key in order to create herd immunity and to stop the virus from replicating and mutating.
"I hate to even contemplate how many people would be dying if we didn't have 50% vaccinated," Kaplin said.
With booster shots recently approved in the U.S. for certain at-risk groups, Kaplin is unsure how additional shots could play a role in transmission this winter, as he said the pandemic is essentially an evolving "war zone" with new information coming out constantly.
"If they are recommended by the CDC, I think that everybody should take that very seriously," he said. "The decreased temperature is only going to increase that rate of transmission until we get to herd immunity."
According to the study, knowledge of the way in which COIVD-19 interacts with colder weather will allow for better planning when temperatures begin dropping off in the Northern Hemisphere, both for local and national governments.
"It is reasonable to conclude that this research suggests that, like other seasonal viruses, SARS-CoV-2 [the virus that causes COVID-19] could prove to be extremely difficult to contain over time unless there is a concerted and collaborative global effort to work to end this pandemic," Kaplin told Health Europe.
For the latest weather news check back on AccuWeather.com. Watch AccuWeather Network on DIRECTV, DIRECTVstream, Frontier, Spectrum, fuboTV, Philo, and Verizon Fios. AccuWeatherNOW is streaming on Roku and XUMO
Report a Typo
News / Health
Why one doctor is 'very worried' about COVID-19 heading into winter
By Lauren Fox, AccuWeather staff writer
Published Oct 8, 2021 1:43 PM EST | Updated Oct 8, 2021 1:43 PM EST
Three kids wearing anti-virus masks. (lmgorthand/iStock/Getty Images)
It's a tale as old as time: As temperatures drop, people get sick.
Scientists have long known that common cold and flu cases climb during the colder months of the year, but there were a lot of unknowns in how changes in weather would influence the spread of COVID-19 as it turned cooler in 2020. But recent research from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Louisville has revealed that there are notable trends in how the coronavirus spreads in colder weather -- and the findings are troubling to researchers as the United States heads deeper into autumn and then winter.
"I'm actually quite worried," Adam Kaplin, an adjunct faculty member at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and author of the study, told AccuWeather. "As the temperature gets colder, the rate of transmission goes up for this virus."
The study, which was published in the journal PLOS ONE back in February, revealed that lower daily temperatures correlated with higher rates of transmission for the COVID-19 virus in 50 different countries across the Northern Hemisphere.
The data came from an earlier period of the COVID-19 pandemic when lockdowns and prevention methods were less prevalent, therefore less likely to influence the results of the study. The study was also conducted prior to the emergence of the delta variant.
Many respiratory illnesses, like influenza, tend to be temperature sensitive. The study showed that COVID-19's behavior is consistent with other seasonal respiratory viruses.
According to Kaplin, the research revealed that from the beginning of October to the end of December in 2020, the latitude of a city correlated to its rate of increase of COVID-19 cases. Cities situated at a higher latitude (colder cities) had higher rates of increase of COVID-19 cases than lower-latitude cities, which in general have a warmer climate. This finding supports the observation that the spread of the coronavirus is temperature-sensitive, according to researchers.
“Although COVID-19 is an infectious disease that will have non-temperature dependent transmission, our research indicates that it also may have a seasonal component," Aruni Bhatnagar, co-author of the study and director of the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute at the University of Louisville, told Health Europe. "Of course, the effect of temperature on the rate of transmission is altered by social interventions like distancing, as well as time spent indoors and other factors. A combination of these factors ultimately determines the spread of COVID-19.”
Many studies point to the reason for increased virus spread in the winter to be more related to behavior and how people stay inside more often due to the cold, but Kaplin explained that the viability of the virus plays a large role in whether or not it takes off during the winter.
While it may seem straightforward that colder weather correlates with increased transmission of respiratory viruses, he explained that other variables come into play that could make or break the winter season for virus spread. "Social interventions," as he described them, such as social distancing, mask-wearing and vaccination, can put the spread of the virus in a sort of "plateau" state and prevent the spread from taking off and becoming unmanageable.
At the beginning of October, Alaska had the highest risk of infection due to the rate of new cases per capita with 157 new cases on average per 100,000 residents, according to data from NPR. Over a two-week period beginning in late September, the state saw a 55% increase in new cases and at one point was reporting on average 1,146 new cases each day.
From mid-September through early October, the state experienced cooler-than-average weather in general, AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alan Reppert said, particularly in Anchorage and Fairbanks -- the two most populated cities in the state. Meanwhile, Juneau and Barrow recorded temperatures that were around average during that timeframe, which ranges between 40 and 60 degrees Fahrenheit to start mid-September and between 30 and 50 F in early October.
An image of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes COVID-19, under a microscope. (NIH)
As of Oct. 1, 50.8% of the state's population had been fully vaccinated, compared to 55.9% of the total U.S. population at that point. Following Alaska, the states with the highest risk of infection based on new cases per capita were Wyoming, North Dakota and Montana.
"I am very worried about what's going to happen as the temperature drops, especially because what we're seeing now is an upswing, it's only going to get amplified," Kaplin told AccuWeather. "It's gonna be what we're experiencing now, which is bad, on steroids."
In addition to cold weather causing a potential spike in cases, seasonal allergies that strike in the fall could complicate the matter further, as some symptoms of COVID-19 are very similar to allergy symptoms.
"If you talk to people in the very beginning [of the pandemic], they'll tell you their COVID, they thought it was allergies because they had a runny nose," Dr. Murray Ramanathan, director of Johns Hopkins University Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery in the Greater Washington Area and Associate Professor of Otolaryngology, told AccuWeather.
A fever was previously a tell-tale sign of a person's symptoms being caused by COVID-19 rather than allergies; however, Ramanathan told AccuWeather that people who are vaccinated against the virus and catching the delta variant of the virus aren't experiencing fevers as often.
Without that tell-tale signal of a virus, other symptoms can be even more confusing, but Ramanathan said itchiness of the eyes, nose and throat can be signals that a person's symptoms are indicators of allergies.
"I think it's the trajectory of symptoms that probably matters more than the actual symptoms you have," he explained. Allergy symptoms can "wax and wane," he said, as days go on and a person takes allergy medication. COVID symptoms are unlikely to wax and wane, rather they are likely to get progressively worse if they go untreated.
According to Ramanathan, the common cold is more prevalent this time of year than COVID. "I think that that can be a little bit more difficult to distinguish a difference, because you can feel pretty awful," he explained.
Social interventions are not only effective in battling the COVID-19 pandemic. Last winter, flu activity in the U.S. reached historically low levels, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). "We’re looking very hard for flu," Lynette Brammer, who leads the domestic influenza team for the CDC, told AccuWeather in February. "We’re just not finding it." The historically low flu activity was attributed to social distancing, mask-wearing and other restrictions designed to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
According to a report from the CDC, which stated that both the U.S. and countries in the Southern Hemisphere were experiencing low influenza numbers, a 98% decrease in influenza activity was reported among samples that were tested, and a 61% decrease was found in samples submitted for testing in the first place.
"It's an indicator that's telling us how well the masks work in trying to stop the transmission," Kaplin said. "Last year, enough people I think were worried enough, and there wasn't quite the hype about not wearing masks, that people were masking up."
FILE - In this Dec. 21, 2020, file photo, Michelle Chester, director of employee health services at Northwell Health, prepares the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at Northwell Health's Long Island Jewish Valley Stream hospital in Valley Stream, N.Y. Hospitals and nursing homes across the country are preparing for worsening staff shortages as state deadlines arrive for employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19. New York health care employees had until the end of the day Monday, Sept. 27, 2021, to get at least one dose. (Eduardo Munoz/Pool Photo via AP, File)
He said vaccinating the population, along with other mitigation efforts, is key in order to create herd immunity and to stop the virus from replicating and mutating.
"I hate to even contemplate how many people would be dying if we didn't have 50% vaccinated," Kaplin said.
With booster shots recently approved in the U.S. for certain at-risk groups, Kaplin is unsure how additional shots could play a role in transmission this winter, as he said the pandemic is essentially an evolving "war zone" with new information coming out constantly.
"If they are recommended by the CDC, I think that everybody should take that very seriously," he said. "The decreased temperature is only going to increase that rate of transmission until we get to herd immunity."
According to the study, knowledge of the way in which COIVD-19 interacts with colder weather will allow for better planning when temperatures begin dropping off in the Northern Hemisphere, both for local and national governments.
"It is reasonable to conclude that this research suggests that, like other seasonal viruses, SARS-CoV-2 [the virus that causes COVID-19] could prove to be extremely difficult to contain over time unless there is a concerted and collaborative global effort to work to end this pandemic," Kaplin told Health Europe.
In other news:
For the latest weather news check back on AccuWeather.com. Watch AccuWeather Network on DIRECTV, DIRECTVstream, Frontier, Spectrum, fuboTV, Philo, and Verizon Fios. AccuWeatherNOW is streaming on Roku and XUMO
Report a Typo