Public Health and local hospital officials briefed the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors Tuesday about COVID-19 case and hospitalization trends and the impacts of the contagious Delta variant of the novel coronavirus. 

By July, 95% of sequenced virus samples were Delta variant, showing the dominance of the more-infectious variant, said Public Health Officer Dr. Henning Ansorg. 

With previous strains of the virus, an infected person infected an average of two or three people, Ansorg explained. A person infected with the Delta variant infects six or seven people on average, he said.

The Delta variant also has a shorter incubation period, meaning that it starts to infect people faster, according to Ansorg. 

It is more common now to see vaccinated people get infected with the novel coronavirus, because of how contagious the Delta variant is, Ansorg told the Board of Supervisors. 

While fully vaccinated people are less likely to get infected than unvaccinated people, vaccinated people can be infected with and spread the novel coronavirus to others, Ansorg said.

The three COVID-19 vaccines approved for use in the United States provide strong protection against severe illness, hospitalization and death, he noted, and also reduce a person’s chance of becoming infected. 

“It appears that all of the COVID vaccines that we have available prevent infection of the Delta (variant) anywhere from 65-80%,” he said. 

During public comment, multiple speakers asked about the benefit of COVID-19 vaccination if you can still get infected by the virus, and Ansorg explained that the vaccines reduce the risk of infection as well as serious illness and death. 

Vaccinated people have some protection from getting infected in the first place and will likely clear the virus from their system faster, which means they are contagious for about half the time (about five days) compared to an unvaccinated person, Ansorg said. 

“Unfortunately even vaccinated persons can get infected by the Delta variant mainly because it attacks the local immune system so rapidly that the antibodies are basically outpaced and they can only start clearing the virus once the antibody response is really ramping up in the system,” Ansorg explained.

The recent uptick in cases and hospitalizations due to the Delta variant were driving factors in the county’s indoor mask mandate and many other state decisions mandating vaccine verification in certain workplaces.

Dr. Chuck Merrill of Marian Regional Medical Center and Dr. Lynn Fitzgibbons of Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital urged people to wear masks indoors to prevent the spread of the virus. 

“We have to change the message slightly, we need masks and vaccines. In the scheme of things, a mask is a very small matter if it reduces my chances of getting COVID and if it prevents me from infecting others by being a carrier,” said Third District Supervisor Joan Hartmann.

“Even if I still have to wear a mask, I’m so glad that I am vaccinated because it reduces the odds of me getting a serious disease or hospitalization and it reduces the time I’d be contagious and probably the time I’d have to be quarantined.” 

She continued, “As the variants change, there’s new circumstances. It’s not that we’re changing the goal post, it’s that we’re adapting as the virus changes and that’s how we can out-compete the virus.”

Hospitals Seeing More COVID-19 Patients 

Public Health Director Van Do-Reynoso shared case rates by vaccination status as of Aug. 6 when the countywide case rate was 15.8 daily new cases per 100,000 people. Drilling that figure down, the case rate among unvaccinated residents was 25.4 new cases per 100,000, whereas the low case rate among vaccinated people was 6.9.

“The takeaway here is that our cases were nearly 3.7 times more likely to be unvaccinated than vaccinated. This is a call for vaccination,” Do-Reynoso said.

As of Monday, 63.3% of eligible county residents were fully vaccinated against COVID-19, meaning that roughly 142,000 eligible individuals have yet to take the opportunity to get vaccinated, Do-Reynoso said.

The county is also seeing an uptick in COVID-19 outbreaks, with 33 active outbreaks as of Tuesday, in a wide array of businesses, congregate settings, and educational environments, according to Do-Reynoso.

Additionally, of the 54 patients hospitalized by the virus between May and June, 89% (48 people) were unvaccinated, while 11% (six people) were vaccinated, Do-Reynoso said.

Over the past three months, 80-90% of COVID-19-positive admissions to Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital have been unvaccinated people. 

“Getting vaccinated, at least in Santa Barbara County, reduces your chances of being hospitalized by at least 80%, and at least to me, that is pretty significant,” said First District Supervisor Das Williams.

The Public Health Department is concerned about the trending decline in hospital capacity as local cases increase, Do-Reynoso said. As of Monday, 64.5% of the county’s hospital beds were in use, and 77.6% of the staffed intensive-care unit beds were in use, and both figures are at the cusp of the “red zone,” she added.

“As cases increase, we worry about the capacity of our local hospital system to care not only for the COVID-19 patients, but for patients with other critical medical needs as well,” Do-Reynoso said. 

The number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients is increasing across the county, and most of them are at Marian Regional Medical Center in Santa Maria. 

As of Monday, 44 people were hospitalized at Marian, out of 56 hospitalized countywide, Dr. Chuck Merrill told the Board of Supervisors. He said the hospital had 13 COVID-19 patients in intensive care units on Monday.

Dr. Lynn Fitzgibbons, an infectious diseases physician at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, said she is concerned about the increase in children being hospitalized for COVID-19 across the country. The hospital has had pediatric cases throughout the pandemic, including in recent weeks, she said.

Most children get mild disease from the novel coronavirus, but the number of cases in children is increasing. And as she explained in a webinar last week, about 2-4% of infected children get hospitalized, and a small percentage of a large number is still a medium-sized number.

“We’re grateful for this appreciation but we’re exhausted. And our staff is working so very hard right now including even today engaging in discussions as to how we’re going to care for the potential for an influx of pediatric cases. Man, I wish we weren’t having to talk about that right now,” she said Tuesday. 

Vaccine Booster Shots 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention now recommends an additional third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines for people with moderately to severely compromised immune systems. The recommendation does not apply to people who were vaccinated with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. 

The Santa Barbara County Public Health Department estimates that roughly 13,500 county residents will be eligible to receive the additional dose, and about 700,000 people in California. 

To get the dose, individuals can self attest that they qualify.

Eligible people include those who: are receiving active cancer treatment for tumors or cancers of the blood; received an organ transplant and are taking medicine to suppress the immune system; received a stem cell transplant within the last two years; have a moderate or severe immunodeficiency; have an advanced or untreated HIV infection, or are on active treatment with high-dose corticosteroids or other drugs that suppress the immune system.

— Noozhawk staff writer Jade Martinez-Pogue can be reached at jmartinez-pogue@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.