SAN ANTONIO — Call it a summer spike: COVID-19 numbers continue to climb in the San Antonio area, which is seeing substantial community transmission as the Delta variant runs rampant.
San Antonio Metro Health moved the city's COVID-19 Risk Level into the moderate and worsening zone, citing a critical rise in the 2-week decline in cases and positivity rate and intensified hospital trends.
Bexar County's positivity rate rose to 17% over the last week, meaning for every COVID-test given, nearly one in five returned a positive result. That's an increase of 3.5 percentage points over the week prior.
Meanwhile, an average of 589 new COVID-positive cases each day was reported over the last week. The last time San Antonio's seven-day moving average was that high was February 23, 2021.
As of Tuesday evening, 585 COVID-positive patients are residing in local hospitals. That's the highest number of patients hospitalized since February 22 of this year. 182 patients are in intensive care.
All this comes at a time when vaccination rates have plateaued in Bexar County. Since the start of July, 29,424 residents received their first dose, while 45,402 residents received their second dose. In June, 151,588 residents received their first dose, while 159,585 residents got their second shot.
Friday, local health authorities and city leaders urged residents to get vaccinated to help protect themselves and their loved ones from COVID-19, while also providing information on testing locations, upcoming vaccination clinics.
At that press conference, leaders said more than 95% of patients hospitalized in the area were unvaccinated.
The Centers for Disease Control revised its guidance on masks Tuesday, saying even fully vaccinated Americans should wear masks indoors in places where there is high transmission. Bexar County falls in that category, according to a map from the CDC.
San Antonio area hospitals reinstated visitor restriction policies given the rise In hospitalizations in Bexar County. In their announcement of the reinstatement Tuesday, University Hospital cited an "alarming rate" of people being hospitalized with COVID-19.
And with students preparing to return back to school, parents of local students are speaking out against the lack of COVID-19 procedures being instituted this school year.